


we are full of stories to be told

by delightfulalot



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, HIMYM AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-03
Updated: 2014-02-03
Packaged: 2018-01-10 19:10:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 36,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1163407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/delightfulalot/pseuds/delightfulalot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry and Louis get engaged and break up and then married; Liam accidentally tells Zayn he’s in love with him on their first date but they end up being friends (and maybe more); Niall shears a sheep and gets slapped in the face a lot. or: the HIMYM AU with my favorite plots from the first two seasons, where Harry is Marshall, Louis is Lily, Liam is Ted, Zayn is Robin, and Niall is Barney.</p>
            </blockquote>





	we are full of stories to be told

**Author's Note:**

> art throughout the story is by [kara decisions-and-revisions](http://decisions-and-revisions.tumblr.com). title is from “laughter lines” by bastille. thanks are at the end. 
> 
> disclaimer: i own nothing and no one, especially not one direction or how i met your mother.
> 
> this is not just an au, this is an homage: there are lines shamelessly yanked from the show, and for that, i would apologize but they’re just too good not to use.

 

 

 

“I think I’m in love with Zayn,” Liam says, and Harry and Louis groan. “What?” Liam asks, bewildered, sliding into his seat in the booth across from them.

“Dammit, Liam. Again?” Louis asks, sounding like he’s at the end of his rope.

“No, for real this time.” Liam hadn’t meant it last time he’d said it, not really. He’d been distracted by warm brown eyes and an elusive smile. Now he _knows_ Zayn – they’ve all been friends for ages, the three of them and Niall, Zayn slotting into their group quickly and easily, over a year ago now. They’ve gotten to know each other, beyond just ‘that cute boy at the bar,’ and now Liam’s pretty sure – this is love.

“That’s what you said last time,” Harry points out, and Louis nods emphatically, arms folded over his chest.

“Exactly,” he says pointedly.

“But this time I _know_ him,” Liam insists, and Louis scoffs.

“So it’ll be worse when you crash and burn!”

“What’s Liam thinking of doing now?” Niall asks, suddenly appearing at the table with four beers. Harry makes a pleased noise and grabs for his and Louis’ as Niall sets them all down. Louis shoots a harsh look at Liam.

“He’s convinced he’s in love with Zayn.”

“Dammit, Liam. Again?” Niall asks, pulling a chair over to their booth and straddling it backwards.

“That’s exactly what I said!” Louis exclaims. Niall gives him a high five and returns his attention to Liam.

“What did I say when we met in the toilet all those years ago?”

“’Get rid of the goatee’?” Liam guesses.

“And what else?”

Liam shrugs, looking blank. Niall sighs.

“I said, as long as you do everything I say, your life will be so awesome you won’t know what to do with yourself.”

Liam snorts. “Still waiting on that one, mate.”

Niall reaches over and slaps the back of Liam’s head. “It’s because you won’t follow any of my instructions!”

“Hey! I got rid of the goatee!”

“And yet you kept that mustache for _weeks_ , Li, it was really uncool,” Louis pipes up, and Harry laughs so hard into his beer he splashes it all over his face.

Once everyone’s stopped laughing, Liam tries to defend himself again.

“I’m serious, guys. It’s different this time.”

“What’s different?” and oh, there’s Zayn. He’s standing next to Niall’s chair, unwinding a scarf from around his neck, cheeks slightly pink from the cold.

“Nothing!” Liam says, his voice high and nervous and oh god, why doesn’t the floor just open up and swallow him right here. He clears his throat and takes a sip of his beer, hoping one of the others will rescue him.

No one does, of course. Louis even _shrugs_ , the bastard. To his credit, Zayn just says, “Okay,” and nods, sliding into the booth next to Liam. Harry raises his eyebrows and gets the shadow of a grin on his face. Liam narrows his eyes, but then Harry just shakes his head, grinning wider, and puts his arm around Louis’ shoulders, Louis automatically moving to tuck himself closer to Harry.

“How was work, Zayn?” Louis asks, and Zayn beams at him. Liam tries not to glare at Louis but fails. Louis’ very mature response is to stick his tongue out.

“Fantastic,” Zayn says, and oh right, work. “You know that gallery owner I interviewed a few months ago?”

Everyone shakes their head except for Liam, who says, “The one with the multimedia art gallery, right?”

“That’s the one,” Zayn says, wrapping one hand around Liam’s bicep and squeezing. “He called in to the magazine today, asked if we had any contacts for artists laying around, since he’s trying to put together a show at the end of the month. Long story short – I’m going to bring some of my stuff in on Friday so he can see if he can use it!”

Everyone makes excited noises; Niall holds up his hand for a high five and Zayn responds with his free hand and that’s when Liam realizes Zayn’s still got one arm wrapped around his, his hand having slid down to rest in the crook of Liam’s elbow. Liam stares at it for just a second, heat spreading through his arm from the contact point. He looks up, across the table, to find Harry looking straight back at him, grinning. Liam smiles back, slowly, even as Harry’s raising his eyebrows at Zayn’s hand and nodding. God, he really is the opposite of subtle.

“– And you all have to promise to be there to cheer me on,” Zayn’s saying when Liam finally tunes back in to the conversation.

“Oh, absolutely, mate!” Louis says.

“I’ll look up some fancy art terms so it sounds like I know what I’m doing when I talk up your stuff,” Niall promises.

“You don’t have to talk it up if you don’t like it,” Zayn says, but he’s got a pleased little smile on his face. Liam wants to kiss it. He settles for wrapping his hand around Zayn’s, still in the crook of his other elbow, and squeezing.

“You’re so talented, Zayn, I’m sure we’ll love it,” Liam says, maybe just a little softer than someone who’s “just a friend” would say. Zayn doesn’t seem to notice, though, as he ducks his head and looks up at Liam through his eyelashes.

“Thanks, Li,” he says, just as softly. Liam’s heart aches.

 

-

 

 

Liam meets Zayn on what ends up being a fairly momentous night, and not just because he, you know, _meets Zayn_. In fact, he only meets Zayn because he’s out with Niall, and he’s out with Niall because he can’t be at home, and he can’t be at home because Harry has a big night planned, one that hopefully doesn’t include any sex in the common areas, _again_. Honestly, the number of times Liam has come across Harry and Louis _defiling their home_ when Harry has a perfectly nice bedroom with a perfectly nice bed only fifty feet away is frankly outrageous. They had once even managed to break a lamp _and_ knock one of the legs of the couch off at the same time. The whole thing had tilted slightly to the left until Louis finally stuck one of Harry’s school books under it. It works pretty well, actually. Harry always knows where his tort reform book is when he needs it and the couch is only lopsided while he’s studying.

Anyway, Harry has a big night planned, and Liam is supposed to be out of the flat for most of the night, so Harry can cook dinner and probably light candles or something else equally cheesy. It’s his and Louis’ tenth anniversary, and Liam is feeling particularly single, and when he feels too single for his own good he likes to hang out with the only person who’s never made him _want_ to find someone to settle down and have a million babies with, so he texts Niall to meet him at the pub. Even though Liam and Harry literally live upstairs, Niall beats him there. Since Liam has never once been to Niall’s flat, he half suspects that he curls up into a ball behind the bar when they close. At the very least, he wouldn’t be surprised.

“What are the lovebirds up to tonight?” Niall asks when Liam joins him in their booth, a pint already waiting for him.

“It’s their tenth anniversary,” Liam says, and if anyone were to say he sounds glum, well. They wouldn’t exactly be _wrong_. “Harry’s making dinner.”

“Ugh, disgusting.”

“But nice.”

Niall sets his beer down and gives Liam a thoughtful look. “Mate, what did I say when we first met?”

“’Get rid of the goatee’?”

“Anyone would say that, goatees look good on absolutely no one.”

“Except Iron Man.”

“Well, even that’s a bit iffy,” Niall says, ignoring Liam’s frown. “No, I said you shouldn’t even think about settling down until you’re thirty. Your tenth anniversary should happen when you’re forty, and not before. Unless! You’re actually celebrating your tenth anniversary of being awesome. Which at the rate you’re going will probably take place never.”

“Hey,” Liam protests, but he’s still smiling. Niall grins and leans back in his seat, looking a bit smug, like he does when he gets Liam out of his head. Niall might be a bit ridiculous, but he does help Liam be less serious all the time.

“Now,” Niall says, “is there anyone in this bar you wouldn’t mind going home with? Because it has been much too long since we’ve played ‘Have You Met Liam?’”

“Oh, no, I hate ‘Have You Met Liam?’ Can’t I just meet someone on my own?”

“Nope! I am your wingman, Payne, I am here to get you into some bloke’s pants. What about that one?” He points to someone at the bar behind Liam, which means Liam would have to _turn around_ and Niall has been speaking at his normal volume which means _everyone in the pub has heard him_ , so instead of looking Liam just slides down in his seat and tries to be invisible.

“One of these days you’re going to actually embarrass me into an early grave, I think.”

“You look cute all flustered, ‘m actually doing you a favor,” Niall says with a wink, before downing half his beer in one gulp and standing up. “Now. C’mon. Let’s find you a man.”

“Oh for the love of –“ Liam mutters, his cheeks heating up, but he takes a fortifying gulp of his beer and follows Niall.

Niall’s first victim is a guy who is terribly, desperately straight, practically hurting himself trying to flirt with a tall brunette woman who is incredibly out of his league, but Niall uses the opportunity to charm the woman, so Liam takes one for the team and keeps talking to the guy. He keeps looking sadly over Liam’s shoulder at his former companion, who keeps laughing and playfully hitting Niall.

“Sorry, mate, I think you’ve lost her,” Liam eventually says, and the guy just kind of nods sadly and takes off not long after that. Niall doesn’t notice – he’s too busy signaling the bartender to get the woman another drink – so Liam leans against the bar and looks around the room. He’s not looking for anyone in particular, really. Even if he’d come downstairs with the idea that he’d maybe find someone to go home with tonight, he’s not really in the mood anymore. He’s starting to feel just a little sorry for himself, like he’ll never find “the one” or get to settle down, never have what Harry and Louis have, when he spots quite possibly the most gorgeous man he’s ever seen.

He’s the epitome of _tall dark and handsome_ , with dark hair and beautiful eyebrows and his _cheekbones_ , dusted with dark stubble that Liam wants to feel against his cheek and his chest and his inner thighs and –

The man suddenly looks directly at Liam. For once in his life, Liam doesn’t blush or turn away immediately. Instead, he looks directly back and even smiles. The man’s mouth twitches, like he’s trying to fight a smile, and then he turns back to his conversation with his friend. Oh, this is happening.

He’s just about to gather his nerves and go interrupt their conversation when Niall literally knocks into him, the beers in his hands spilling a little onto Liam’s sleeve.

“Oi, watch it!” Liam exclaims, but Niall doesn’t even acknowledge it, just hands one of the beers to Liam and says, “That ended up being a waste, she’s got a boyfriend at home. I wish everybody in relationships wore rings, I’d save a lot of time that way.”

“But you wouldn’t get the practice you need to be able to take the single girls home.”

“Ah, that’s true! You’re so smart sometimes, I knew there was a reason I kept you around. Anyway, how’d you do?”

“With what?”

“That guy I introduced to you. I don’t see him around, so not _too_ well, obviously, but did you get a number at least?”

“Oh, right. He was a dud. But d’you see that guy over there?” Liam points towards the gorgeous man with his chin as subtly as he can. Even if the man’s not facing him, he still doesn’t want to seem too obvious.

Sometimes he forgets that Niall doesn’t _know_ how to be subtle. “Oh, that’s dirty sex, right there.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Liam mutters, immediately spinning around to face the bar and shield his face with his hand. “You are _so loud_. You are like a human megaphone.”

“You love me,” Niall says happily, and then, “Oh, look who’s coming this way!”

“What?!” Liam’s head snaps up to catch the man walking towards them, most likely headed for the bar but _that’s where they are_. “Oh my god.”

Liam drops his gaze back to the top of the bar, both hands on either side of his face like blinders, but he still doesn’t miss it when Niall taps the gorgeous man on the shoulder and says, “Hi. Have you met Liam?” and hightails it out of there. Liam drops his hands, steels himself, and looks up with a forced smile.

He’s met with absolutely _breathtaking_ brown eyes smiling at him. “I guess you’re Liam,” the man says, and he holds out a hand. “I’m Zayn.”

“Hi. Yes, I’m Liam. And you’re Zayn! That’s nice,” Liam babbles. Zayn quirks one eyebrow but his mouth curves into a smile, so Liam takes that as encouragement. “It is nice to meet you.”

“I noticed you across the bar. You know, you’ve got a gorgeous smile.”

Liam’s brain completely shuts down for a moment, and then it’s like a cool, suave version of him just _appears_ , the version that Niall’s been trying to get him to be for ages. “You’re one to talk. Your whole face lights up when you smile, you look like you could sell toothpaste or something.”

Okay, so the cool, suave version of Liam isn’t that different from the regular version. But he’s managed to make words come out of his mouth while Zayn has stood there looking _drop-dead amazing_ , it’s frankly a miracle in itself.

Luckily, Zayn laughs.

They talk for fifteen minutes – about what, Liam will never remember – until Zayn’s friends call him back, and Zayn leaves begrudgingly, but not before sliding his card into the inside pocket of Liam’s blazer, a move that Liam will never forget.

When Liam makes it back to the flat, four hours after he left and hopefully at least twenty minutes after whatever sex Louis and Harry had out in the open, he feels like he’s floating on air. His smile only gets wider when he opens the door to the flat and Louis and Harry are lying on the couch, Louis lying between Harry’s legs but both thankfully fully clothed.

“Mum, Dad, I’ve met the future Mr. Liam Payne,” he proclaims.

“You’re the mum,” Harry says to Louis, who frowns and says, “You know _you’re_ actually Liam Payne, right?”

“Of course I do. I just meant I’ve met my future husband tonight.”

“Oh, right! When we get married,” Louis says to Harry, “I’m not taking your name.”

“You don’t like Louis Styles?” Harry says, and then makes a face. “No, you’re absolutely right. Well, I’m not taking your name, either.”

“We’ll just have to make up a new name for both of us, then.”

“Yeah. Like ‘Awesome’.” Harry says it like a throwaway, but his eyes immediately light up and he sits up a little straighter. “Like, ‘Have you met the Awesomes? Harry, Louis, their son Totally and their daughter Freaking.’”

Louis twists around in Harry’s arms just a little so he can kiss him and says, “I love you so much but that is absolutely not happening.”

“I am going to wear you down with so many blowjobs you won’t be able to see straight to sign the marriage certificate.”

“Oh are you?”

“Yeah, I am.”

Then they start murmuring into each other’s mouths between kisses, and it’s all rather disgusting and nothing Liam hasn’t seen before. He sighs and prepares to yell at them to get them back on track to the important task at hand: talking about Liam and his breathtaking future life partner, but then what Harry and Louis had been saying actually hits him.

“Wait a minute. Wait. Are you two – are you engaged?”

They pull apart just far enough to aim beaming smiles at Liam, and Louis holds up his left hand to show off a thin silver band. “We’re getting Hazza one just like it tomorrow, so everyone knows it’s hands off him as well.”

“It’s been hands off me since the day we met,” Harry says, looking directly at Louis, who seems to actually melt and kisses him, deep. Liam is in turns jealous, happy for them, and, as Louis actually _rolls over_ so he’s lying on top of Harry, the entire lengths of their bodies pressed together, just this side of disgusted.

“Hey. Hey!” Nothing. Harry’s hands actually slide into the back pockets of Louis’ sweatpants, cupping his ass, and Liam sighs, long and loud.

Louis breaks away long enough to say, “At this point, Payno, your sighing is practically an aphrodisiac.”

“Before you two start going at it right in front of me, _again_ , I thought I’d tell you a little more about my future husband?”

It’s Louis’ turn to sigh, incredibly melodramatically, when Harry sits all the way up and says, “Tell us all about him. Where’d you meet?”

“Downstairs at the pub,” Liam says. “And he’s gorgeous with unbelievable brown eyes and he just laughed when I made a fool of myself and he gave me his number and we’re going out next week.”

“And what does he do?” Harry asks, and Liam opens his mouth to respond, and then closes it again.

“I’m not sure. Possibly a model for toothpaste, he laughed when I mentioned it.”

Harry gives him a slightly pitying look, but Louis says, “You at least got his name, I hope.”

“Yes! His name is Zayn.”

There’s a beat as both Harry and Louis seem to be waiting for Zayn’s last name, which Liam unfortunately cannot give them, and he blushes, just a little. Finally, Harry says, “Well! Gorgeous Zayn with the brown eyes who might be a toothpaste model is the future Mr. Liam Payne. Good to know!”

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t rush to invite him to our wedding quite yet,” Louis says dryly. Liam frowns and apparently looks sad enough for Louis to actually disentangle himself from Harry and walk over to where Liam’s sitting and tousle his hair.

“I’m sure, if he’s as great as you say he is, he’ll be in the wedding party in no time,” he says, just a little begrudgingly.

Liam looks up and smiles and grabs Louis’ hand to plant a large sloppy kiss to the back of it. Louis grimaces in that way that means he’s trying not to smile and holds his other hand out to Harry, who gladly stands and takes it. Louis starts walking backwards to Harry’s room, pulling Harry along, and says, “Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s been 45 minutes since that thing in the kitchen, so I’m going to have sex with my fiancé!”

Liam groans and puts his head in both hands. As the door clicks shut, he shouts, “Did you really have sex in the kitchen?”

“And Harry ate the orange that was under your fridge!” Louis calls back, laughing.

“Sorry, Li!” Harry calls, but he’s laughing too, the bastard. Liam makes a disgusted noise and heads to the kitchen to start scrubbing the whole thing down, but then he hears Harry and Louis start to go at it and changes directions. He barricades himself in his room and puts on headphones and buries himself under the covers, doing his hardest to ignore the increasingly louder noises coming from Harry’s room.

Liam calls Zayn the next day, even as Niall is texting him _its too soon mate its too soon you’ll seem desparate !!_

Zayn sounds pleased to hear from him, though, and they make plans for next weekend and Liam tries to decide if he wants to stop by the pub to show off his fit date to his friends before or after dinner. In the end, Zayn offers to meet at the pub, saying it’s closer to his work and he’s got a late shift on Saturday. Liam immediately offers to switch the date to Sunday, or next week, _knowing_ he’s too eager and yet unable to stop the words coming out of his mouth. But Zayn just lets out a soft laugh and says it’ll be nice to have something to look forward to.

Liam spends the next few days floating on air, but Saturday finds him lying on the floor of his bedroom, surrounded by the contents of his entire closet and bemoaning the fact he has nothing to wear. Niall suggests he wear just his pants, “show him what he’s got to look forward to,” with a suggestive eyebrow wiggle. Louis stands behind Niall in the doorway to Liam’s room, completely failing to stifle his laughter and nodding in agreement. Harry, though – Harry his oldest friend, Harry his best mate – takes pity on Liam, pushes the other two aside, and picks up a pair of trousers, a plaid button-up, and a blazer, and drops them on Liam’s chest.

Liam sits up and looks at the clothes approvingly – the blazer is even the one he was wearing when he met Zayn, and Liam hopes it works as a reminder of Zayn’s hands sliding in, brushing over his chest, plus it is his best one.

“Thanks, mate,” Liam says, voice full of the relief spreading over him.

Harry nods and says, “Are you sure I can’t get you into some of my skinny jeans?”

Louis frowns. “Hey, only _I_ am allowed in your skinny jeans!” Everyone ignores him.

Liam shakes his head. “Don’t think it’s for me, no.”

“Then please, please, belt your trousers around your waist. We are not 20 anymore.”

Liam frowns, though that’s mainly at Louis and Niall, laughing so hard they have to back completely out of the room, and nods. “I promise. Belt around waist, not bum.”

Harry grins. “I’m not saying it’s not nice, but you’ve got to have at least a little bit of mystery.” He claps one hand on Liam’s shoulder. “We’ll let you get ready then, and see you down at the pub later, yeah?” 

Liam nods distractedly and only sort of hears Harry leave the room, followed by the front door opening and closing, leaving the flat silent. Liam takes a deep breath, feeling his excitement from earlier in the week creeping back in, and starts getting dressed.

By the time he makes it to the pub almost an hour later, hair artfully styled to look completely casual, he feels a little bit like he’s going to vibrate out of his skin. He takes a seat in their booth, across from Harry and Louis with Niall sitting in a chair pulled up to the edge, but almost as soon as he’s slid all the way in he slides back out.

“I’ll get us some pints,” he says, ignoring the nearly full glasses in front of everyone and heading for the bar. He doesn’t look back but he’s entirely sure his friends are trying not to laugh at him. He doesn’t blame them, really; he knows he’s being ridiculous, but he can’t seem to help it.

When he turns around from the bar, two glasses in each hand, he darts a glance towards the door just as Zayn comes in, and he can feel the goofy smile stretching across his face and his cheeks heating up. He raises his hands, beers and all, and calls, “Zayn!”

Zayn’s eyes catch his immediately and his entire face lights up. Liam stands where he is, only slightly awkward, as Zayn makes his way over.

“Good to see you, mate,” he says when he reaches Liam, and makes an aborted gesture like he was going to hug him but can’t, because of the beers in Liam’s hands. Liam thinks he feels his heart flutter, and then it beats extra hard when Zayn looks him up and down and he says, “You’re looking fantastic.”

Liam’s cheeks heat up and he ducks his head before saying, “You, too.”

Zayn makes a face, but Liam thinks he can almost see a smile. “This? I just came from work, I feel terrible I barely even tried.” He’s wearing black jeans and a leather jacket zipped up over what looks to be a black t-shirt. It’s true, it’s not a suit or even a blazer but – it’s definitely enough for Liam.

“No, it’s – it’s great. You look great. The whole all black thing really works for you, it’s – it’s great. Did I say that already?”

Zayn does smile this time. “Yeah, but it’s okay. Is one of those for me?” he asks, gesturing to the beers in Liam’s hands, and Liam’s heart drops.

“Oh my god I forgot to order a beer for you.”

“Are these all for you, then?” Zayn asks, and the tips of Liam’s ears heat and he gets flustered.

“No, these are – you’re teasing.”

“A little bit, yeah. Where are you sitting? I’ll get a beer for myself and then meet you over there?”

“Absolutely not. I asked you out, I’m supposed to pay for everything.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Zayn says, but he sounds pleased.

“No arguing. C’mon, come meet the gang and then I’ll get you a beer.”

Liam introduces Zayn to everyone – Louis’ eyes go wide when he spots Zayn, and Liam feels a little thrill of pleasure that Zayn is _his_ date – and then leaves him there when he orders another beer. When he gets back, sliding into the booth next to Zayn, across from Harry and Louis, Niall off somewhere trying to pull already, Zayn gives him a little smile and Liam is pretty sure he could do this for the rest of his life.

They only stay for one beer, and then it’s off to make their dinner reservations. The place was suggested by someone at Liam’s firm, another architect, who’d said it was very romantic, but it mainly seems to be dark.

It’s light enough to make out Zayn’s t-shirt when he finally unzips his jacket, though.

Liam’s taking a sip of his drink when he does it, and he almost chokes to death.

“Are you okay?” Zayn asks, worried, but Liam just coughs a couple times and sets his drink down.

“Is that a Batman shirt?”

“Oh.” Zayn looks down at his shirt, which has the Batman logo in yellow on a black background. He smiles sheepishly when he looks back at Liam. “Yeah, it is. I’m kind of a fan, I guess.”

Liam grins, and they spend their dinner (which unfortunately consists of weird food in tiny portions) deep in conversation about comics. Instead of dessert, Zayn mentions he has a copy of a rare comic that Liam’s _heard_ about, but has never actually _seen_ , and Zayn slyly invites him over to read it.

Liam’s pretty sure he’s in love, even before they get to Zayn’s flat and he puts on some slow music and asks if Liam wants a nightcap while holding up a bottle of really good scotch.

Which is fine. It’s probably a little early in their relationship to have those thoughts, but Liam’s always been one to fall hard and fast, so it makes sense. As long as he doesn’t say anything, he’ll probably be fine and won’t scare him away or anything.

So then, of course, Zayn walks back over to Liam, carrying two glasses of scotch in one hand and a comic in plastic in the other, and Liam blurts out, “Pretty sure I’m in love with you.”

Zayn completely freezes. He’s been very understanding so far, and Liam hopes he can play the whole thing off.

“Talking to the comic,” he says with an awkward laugh, and Zayn lets out a relieved sigh.

“Oh, yeah, of course. It’s a Mike Mignola cover, isn’t it beautiful?” He holds it out, looking a little in awe, and he’s so gorgeous that Liam can’t even look at the comic, he just looks at the stars in Zayn’s eyes and repeats, “I’m in love with you.”

And that pretty much kills the night.

“That one was for me, wasn’t it?”

Liam flinches. “Yeah, that one was for you. Probably a little too early in the relationship for that.”

“Just a little,” Zayn says, with a tiny smile that doesn’t reach his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Liam says, “I’m not usually like this. That’s a lie, I don’t know why I said it, I’m always falling in love too soon but this is _way_ too soon, even for me.” He takes a deep breath, tries to start over. “You see, my best mates just got engaged.”

“Harry and Louis.”

“Right! And the weird thing is, they’ve been together for ten years and practically married that whole time, but now it’s actually _real_. They’ve got engagement rings and their mums won’t stop calling with wedding advice and, I don’t know, I guess I just went a little mad. And then I met you, and you were perfect….” Liam trails off and gives a little shrug.

“You barely know me.”

“But I’d like to get to know you,” Liam says, and then shakes his head. “That sounds like a cheesy chat-up line, but it is true.”

Zayn looks at him, just a little pityingly, and _oh_ , if that doesn’t break Liam’s heart. “I don’t really think that’s in the cards for us,” he says softly.

Liam nods. “Yeah, I guess I figured. I’ll just be going then?”

“Probably best.”

Liam leaves but then turns around, right outside the flat, and Zayn leans against the doorway, looking at him. “When you tell your friends about this, try not to use the word ‘psycho.’ I’d prefer ‘eccentric’, if possible.”

Zayn acts like he’s thinking it over, and then says, “No, I’m pretty sure I’m going to use ‘psycho’.”

Liam smiles sadly. “Fair enough. Well. It was nice to meet you, Zayn.”

He holds out a hand. Zayn takes it.

“Goodnight, Liam. It was a pretty nice date, end of it notwithstanding.”

“Yeah. I’m not great at closing,” Liam says, and with a final squeeze, lets go of Zayn’s hand, turns around, and walks away.

 

-

 

 

Louis is going to get back into painting, yes he is. He hasn’t really worked with anything more complex than fingerpaints and watercolors since his final art project in uni, which is just unacceptable. He used to buy canvases in stacks of five, smell constantly of turpentine and always have dried paint on random parts of his body (and usually some on Harry’s, as well). He was a _proper artist_ , and every time he tells his students’ parents that he believes the arts are an essential part of education, as he is an artist himself, he feels like a fraud.

So Louis enrolls in an art class that take place on Wednesday nights at his school.

He mentions it to Harry, one night while they’re lying in bed talking about their days, right after Harry’s finished explaining the joke his friend Ed told after class (some dumb thing that Louis only half-gets, and that half isn’t very funny, but he laughs anyway, because Harry does). He tries to make it sound nonchalant, a quick little, “I signed up for an art class, might be fun,” dropped in between stories about his kids, but Harry picks up on it.

“You’re gonna start painting again?” Harry asks, sounding cautiously optimistic. He’s had his arm wrapped around Louis’ shoulders since they laid down, one thumb slowly rubbing Louis’ arm, and he stops moving, almost seems to stop breathing waiting for Louis’ answer.

Louis has always had a little bit of a flair for the dramatic.

“Yes?” he squeaks out. Suddenly he’s not sure if this is something he should be doing. What kind of artist just stops doing anything art related for the better part of a decade? “Oh, god, it’s a terrible idea, isn’t it,” he says rather than asks, before Harry has a chance to say anything else, sitting up so Harry’s hands fall completely away. “I was just kidding myself, it was stupid, I’m sure if I stop by before work tomorrow they would give me my deposit back. Yeah, that’s better anyway, that’s what I’ll do.”

“Wait. Lou, wait, calm down.” Harry wraps his arms around Louis’ waist and drops his head on his knee, looking up into his eyes. Louis automatically breathes slower, just gazing at Harry. He is _so far gone_ , has been since the moment he first laid eyes on tall, gangly 18-year-old Harry Styles, brushing his teeth in the dorm bathroom clothed in only the smallest boxer briefs known to man. He’d caught Louis’ wide eyes in the mirror and smiled, mouth full of foam, and Louis has never looked back.

“I think it’s _great_ that you’re painting,” Harry says, and Louis lets out all his breath in a rush and nods, so quickly he’s like one of those bobblehead dogs that sit on car dashboards. Harry reaches one hand up to rest on Louis’ cheek, and Louis stills.

“I’ll be your model again, if you want,” Harry says with a grin, and Louis groans and falls back onto his pillow. Harry rearranges himself until he’s got his head on Louis’ chest, arms around his waist, curls facing Louis.

“I don’t think we’ll be doing nude portraits right away, but thanks.”

“Who said I had to be nude? I could just be eating a banana or something.”

Louis snorts. “I’m pretty sure that’d be worse than you being nude, babe.”

“Why would that be worse?” and even though he can’t see Harry’s face, Louis is positive he’s frowning, that cute little consternated frown he gets when someone teases him.

“You’re just so good at eating bananas,” Louis says fondly, tangling one hand in Harry’s curls.

“I _am_ very good at it,” Harry says, a strong note of pride in his voice, and Louis loves him, oh he loves him. “And _you_ ,” he continues, “are very good at painting.”

“Let’s not get carried away, I’m just okay.”

“No, you’re so good, Lou! What about that painting you did for that one class, with the rain?”

Louis has to wrack his brain to remember a dark gray muddled mess of a canvas, trying to capture the “meaning of the rain,” whatever that meant. He’d finally just left the whole thing outside one afternoon, pretended that he meant for it to get rained on, and bullshitted something about the fragility of life to his professor. He’d gotten an A, because sometimes being an art student meant being good at bullshitting, and Louis was an excellent art student.

“You remember that?” he asks, shocked, and Harry turns his head to look at him, his face serious.

“I remember everything you ever painted.”

Louis pulls him up to kiss him, long and deep. Harry wraps a hand around Louis’ neck and kisses him back easily. When Harry pulls back, he’s grinning.

“You totally want to paint me naked again, don’t you?”

“Shut up,” Louis says, but he’s smiling as he kisses Harry again.

So Louis starts going to classes on Wednesday nights. He leaves the rest of the boys at the pub with a kiss on Harry’s cheek and admonitions for everyone to behave, a glint in Niall’s eye that means that Louis will get a phone call in three hours to bail them out from whatever small town they’ve managed to get themselves arrested in. It’s happened enough that everyone keeps a “Niall fund” for just such occasions, but it’s mostly harmless, so Louis doesn’t really worry as he takes the familiar route to his school, heading straight to the art studio in the back of the building.

He sets up an easel in the middle of the room and pulls out his pencils and his paints. The motions are so familiar to him, coming back after years and years, that he relaxes enough to actually look around. It’s a pretty diverse crowd, age-wise. There’s a teenage girl in the corner who looks a little like she could beat him up, and an old woman near her that Louis immediately names “Grandma Moses” in his head. There are a few people his age, as well, including –

“Zayn!” Louis calls, and he looks up from where he’s just come into the room, messenger bag over one shoulder and head facing the floor. Louis smiles at him and gestures for him to come over. To Louis’ delight, he does.

“Hey,” Zayn says as he reaches him, a tiny smile on his face. “Louis, right? Liam’s friend?”

“That’s me,” Louis says happily, reaching to shake Zayn’s hand. “I’ll tell you, it’s so nice to see a friendly face here.”

“Oh, yeah? You nervous?”

“A bit. I was an art major at uni, but since then I’ve only really taught five-year-olds how to paint with brushes instead of their fingers. Trying to get back into the swing of things, you know?” When Zayn nods, Louis smiles and asks, “How about you?”

“I saw an ad for this class in the magazine I work for, and I’ve never worked in oil before, so I thought it’d be a good opportunity.” He grins. “Pretty cool to know someone, though.”

“Absolutely,” Louis says. “I can tell we’re gonna end up being best friends.” He waits a beat, and then adds, “As long as I promise not to mention I’m in love with you.”

Zayn bursts out laughing, and Louis grins. Oh, yes. This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. 

Louis takes Zayn to the pub after class, half of him hoping the boys are still there and half of him hoping they aren’t. They’re not – he gets a text half an hour after they arrive that just says _niall sheared a sheep_ and he just really does not want to know – and so he and Zayn settle at the bar, drink a couple of beers and talk. He learns that Zayn just moved to London a few months ago with hopes of being a paid artist, but until he gets his big break he’s working at an art magazine where he interviews people who do what he wants to do for a living and seethes, quietly.

Well, he doesn’t say that last part, but Louis is very perceptive.

They also talk about their families, and Louis discovers that Zayn’s got an older sister and two little ones, and they spend a good half hour talking about tea parties and dance sessions and attending stuffed animal weddings.

Louis just – he _likes_ Zayn, a lot, likes being able to talk to him about younger siblings and art, stuff that Harry and Liam will listen to, sure, they’re both nice lads, but that they don’t really understand or care about. It’s nice, having someone around who understands him, his own friend for once, not one Harry introduced him to (the fact that he only called out to Zayn because of his date with Liam doesn’t count; Louis is sure they would have become friends anyway).

Louis doesn’t mean to tell the boys that he’s hanging out with Zayn – well, actually, he doesn’t mean to tell _Liam_. Liam’s been moping around for weeks now, convinced he’s lost the love of his life, spending entirely too much of his free time in the pub, hoping that Zayn’ll show up again. Louis feels for him, he really does, but it’s starting to get a little embarrassing, a bit like that time at university when he pined after his sixth form girlfriend, some absolute twat who treated him like rubbish. So Louis doesn’t really want to tell Liam that he’s hanging around with the man once dubbed “the future Mr. Payne,” especially because Louis doesn’t want to scare Zayn off.

The problem, however, is that Louis tells Harry absolutely everything, has been doing it for so long that it’s practically second nature, so even though he tries his hardest to conceal it, it only takes until his second class with Zayn before he spills everything.

“Wait, back up,” Harry says as they’re lying in bed, going over their days again. “Did you just say you had a drink with Zayn? Liam’s Zayn?”

Louis makes a face. “Well, he’s not really _Liam’s_ Zayn, you know. They only went on the one real date.”

“But it is the same Zayn.”

“How many Zayns do you think there are, Haz, honestly.”

“I’m just surprised,” Harry says slowly. “I didn’t know you and he were still hanging out.”

“It’s not – it’s not _still_ , really, it’s not like I’ve been sneaking off for drinks with him for weeks. He’s in my art class on Wednesdays, we just spent some time together after class while you were off with the lads, that’s all. It’s nice having someone to talk to about art and stuff, you know.”

Harry wraps both arms tight around Louis. “Then I’m glad, Lou. I won’t tell Liam if you don’t want me to.”

Louis sighs. “You don’t have to lie to him but – if you could maybe just not mention it? I just don’t want to make Zayn uncomfortable.”

“Anything for you,” Harry says, nuzzling Louis’ neck, curls tickling his cheek and making him giggle, and then they stop talking for a while.

Literally the very next time he sees Liam, sliding into their booth at the pub after work the next day, he gets a glare and “I hear you’ve been hanging out with some interesting people lately,” arms crossed over his chest.

Louis looks at Harry, who’s intently studying his pint glass, not looking at anyone, so Louis just sighs and gets it over with.

“Yeah, I met Zayn at the art class I’ve been taking, and we’ve been going out for a few drinks after. It’s only happened twice.”

Liam immediately drops the tough act and looks at Louis imploringly as he asks, “Did he say anything about me?”

Louis thinks about being harsh, giving Liam the wake-up call he needs, but in the end he just says softly, “You don’t really come up,” and hates the way Liam’s face falls. “It’s not – maybe that’s a _good_ thing,” he rushes to add. “Like, he seems to be over it?”

Liam groans and puts his head in his hands. Harry frowns at Louis and gives him a look that means _fix this_.

“That’s not a bad thing, Li!” Louis exclaims, and when Liam looks up at him, eyes narrowed, he continues, “Maybe he’ll come around with me after class one day. You can get to know him just as a friend with all of us around, no pressure.”

Liam tilts his head just enough so he can see Louis but still keep his head in his hands. Louis smiles softly at him.

“Maybe you can finally start getting over him, yeah?” Louis puts a hand on Liam’s forearm and rubs, slowly. Liam sighs and nods.

“Yeah, that sounds like a good plan, I guess. It’ll be nice to see him again, anyway.”

Louis counts to three in his head, trying not to yell at one of his oldest and best friends in the world. He _literally just said_ it’s time to get over Zayn. Liam _always_ does this, he always falls too hard and too fast and takes ages and ages to get over it. Louis looks at Harry and just says, _please deal with this before I get violent_ over Liam’s head without opening his mouth. Harry nods.

“Just as friends, right, Liam? It’ll be nice to see Zayn again as friends.”

“Hmm? Oh, right, of course! Just as friends.” Harry looks at Louis with a wide smile, like he’s fixed something. Louis wants to roll his eyes or shake his head, but Harry just looks so _pleased_ that all he can do is smile back.

He broaches the topic with Zayn during their class the next week. When the instructor gives them a ten-minute break and Zayn ducks out for a smoke, Louis follows him, pulling his thin coat tighter around him to brace against the chilly February air. Zayn raises his eyebrows at him.

“Didn’t think you smoked, mate.”

Louis shakes his head and smiles. “I don’t. Not tobacco, at least.”

“Oh?” Zayn cocks his head, looking interested. “Good to know.”

“Yeah. No, I just wanted to come out here and have a chat.”

“A chat, huh?”

“Uh-huh.” Louis nods, and then falls silent, just watching Zayn’s hands as he brings the cigarette up to his lips.

“Lou?” he asks after a minute of silence, his eyes sparkling with amusement.

“Hmm?”

“This is a pretty quiet chat.”

Louis’ cheeks heat up. “Sorry, I just – I’m not quite sure how to bring this up?”

Zayn takes a drag and lets out the smoke with a smile. “Have you fallen in love with me too? Whatever will Harry say?”

Louis laughs and shoves Zayn slightly. “Get over yourself, Malik, I am happily engaged to the man of my dreams.”

“Yeah, yeah, quit bragging.”

“It is…kind of about that, though?” Louis says, sobering up, and Zayn nods for him to continue. “It’s about Liam, actually.”

Zayn pauses, just for a split second going tense all over. “What about Liam?”

“I was hoping maybe you’d want to meet him for a drink tonight? With me,” he adds quickly. “And Harry, and probably Niall. The whole gang. You know, they’re my best mates, and you and I get on really well, and just, I think it’ll be fun.” He shrugs once, and then again, and then spends a few seconds arguing with himself whether he should just reach out and ask for one of Zayn’s cigarettes, if only to have something to do with his hands.

But then Zayn nods, exhales a stream of smoke, and smiles. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I can do that.”

Louis’ entire body relaxes. “Good.” He smiles back.

He gets nervous standing outside the pub later that night, though, suddenly convinced that Liam is going to spend literally the entire time mooning over Zayn, hearts in his eyes and only stutters on his tongue. Louis almost pulls out his phone to text Harry and make him sit next to Liam, or get Niall to sit next to Liam or something, _anything_ to avoid Zayn and Liam ending up on the same side of the booth.

He doesn’t have to worry, though, because when he pulls the door to Lloyd’s open, Harry is already sitting next to Liam, Niall sitting across from them. There are also two extra beers at the table, and Louis is hit with a rush of love for Harry all over again. He lets Zayn slide into the booth next to Niall, across from Harry, and pulls a chair up so he can sit down. First, though, he leans over and throws his arms around his fiancé, greeting him with a deep, slightly inappropriate for company kiss.

“Hello, sailor,” Zayn says, laughter evident in his voice.

“They just got engaged,” Niall says, and Louis is pretty sure Zayn is about to say that yeah, he already knows, when Niall continues. “They do this a lot, it’s pretty disgusting.”

Without taking his tongue out of Harry’s mouth, Louis throws Niall a two finger salute. Zayn snorts and Niall guffaws.

“Cheeky bastard,” Niall says, fondly, when Louis finally lets go of Harry and drops into his chair.

“Oh, Nialler, are you jealous? I’m sure Harry’d kiss you too if you asked nicely, he’s very friendly.”

Harry grins. “Get over here,” he says, standing up and leaning over the table toward Niall. Louis laughs and moves their beers out of Harry’s way as he grabs Niall’s face and plants a big sloppy kiss on his forehead with a loud smack. When he takes his seat again, everyone at the table is laughing, Niall the hardest of all, his entire face bright red.

Everything just kind of seems simple after that. Zayn and Louis tell a couple of stories about their art class, Zayn cracking up at Louis’ impression of their instructor, and then Harry, Niall, and Liam trade off telling a story of the last time they almost got picked up by the police, Louis finally learning the story behind the _niall sheared a sheep_ text. It’s nice and comfortable, and they only leave the pub when Cher, the bartender, rings the bell behind the bar signifying last call. They part with hugs on the street outside, Niall and Zayn splitting a cab home and Louis heading upstairs with Harry and Liam.

As Louis lies curled into Harry, later that night, listening as Harry tells an extremely long story about some joke Ed told him at lunch, he feels happy and whole.

 

-

 

 

Zayn has been hanging out with them as a group regularly for about a month, and with Louis alone for about two, when one day, Harry and Liam walk into the flat to find Zayn not only there, while no one whose name is on the lease is home, but sword-fighting. Sword-fighting with Louis, actually, using the swords Liam and Harry bought right after they’d graduated university and decided to move in together, declaring that real lads’ flats had swords on the wall.

Harry is still not entirely sure where they got that idea from, or what even convinced them that their place wouldn’t be _really wicked_ until they had swords hanging up, but he thinks it might have had something to do with the joints they’d shared before heading out to shop.

Wherever the idea came from, for the past six years they’ve had a pair of swords hanging on their wall, and now Louis and Zayn are using them to sword-fight. Both of them are giggling, faces scrunched up in joy, and executing some truly spectacular moves – Zayn goes overhead and Louis ducks, Zayn jumps and Louis swipes his sword under his feet. Harry’s half-content to stand in the doorway and watch, especially as Louis looks particularly _good_ with a sword in his hand, quite like the Man in Black from _The Princess Bride_.  In fact, Louis had once gone as the Man in Black for Halloween, Harry dressing as Fezzik and Liam tagging along as Inigo Montoya. Harry had been unable to keep his eyes off Louis all night, dressed in that tight black costume, black mask covering half his face, and very happily put his hands all over him the second they were alone.

Harry is just starting to remember how he’d asked Louis to keep the mask on while they were having sex, which Louis kept proclaiming quite _weird_ without ever even reaching up to pull it off, when Liam jumps into the fray and everybody stops.

“ _What_ is going on here?” he asks. “Are you _trying_ to put someone’s eye out?”

“Come off it, we’re being careful,” Louis says, slightly breathless, before knocking his sword against Zayn’s where he’s holding it loosely pointed towards the floor. Zayn quirks an eyebrow at him.

“Ready for round two?” he asks. Harry feels a quick flare of jealousy in his chest, but then Louis looks up at him.

“What do you say, babe? Care to watch?” From the look on Louis’ face it’s obvious he knows exactly what Harry’s thinking, just like always.

 “Only if you’re fighting for my honor,” Harry says. Louis grins.

“I wouldn’t dream of fighting for any other reason,” and Harry knows it’s true. He waves a hand as if to say _carry on_ , and Louis gets into position. Zayn imitates him, knees bent and sword raised in the air, and they both make fake-angry faces at each other before Zayn lunges. Harry gasps, just for a second believing it’s real and Lou’s in danger, and then Louis parries and they’re fighting and it’s probably the hottest thing Harry’s ever seen. In the corner of his eye, he thinks he sees Liam sigh and look at him, only to roll his eyes and mutter something that sounds like “Absolutely no help, the lot of you.”

Zayn and Louis pull off another couple awesome moves – over the head, under the legs again – before they both spin around, no longer facing each other, pumping their fists.

“That was fantastic,” Louis crows, excitedly turning back around to face Zayn, who’s nodding and grinning widely.

“Completely _sick_ ,” he agrees. “I can’t believe you just had these hanging on your wall,” he continues, talking directly to Louis.

“Oh, no, I don’t live here,” he says immediately. “I’ve got my own place about twenty minutes from here.”

“Oh,” Zayn says dumbly. He looks like he was walking somewhere and suddenly pulled up short. “I guess I just assumed? Since you’re always here anyway.”

“Well, yeah.” Louis drops his sword on the floor and walks over to where Harry is sat on the couch, dropping heavily into his lap and grinning when Harry gives a great big _oof_. “This place is much closer to my school, and besides, I’ve got my very own fiancé here, who keeps me well sated both food-wise and – _ahem_ – otherwise, if you get my drift.” He waggles his eyebrows. Harry wraps his arms around Louis’ waist and pulls him closer, so he’s leaning sideways into Harry’s chest and Harry can burrow his face into Louis’ neck.

“Cock-wise,” Louis says after a moment when no one responds to his innuendo. “Harry’s got a big cock.”

Liam sighs and rolls his eyes, heading to the kitchen to put the kettle on, Harry supposes. Zayn, who’s only known Louis for a couple of months, has apparently already figured out the best way to deal with him and completely ignores his comment about Harry’s cock, which Harry is grateful for.

“So you’ve got your own place?”

Louis nods. “I have to have my own place. It’s an independence thing.”

Zayn still looks a bit confused. “When was the last time you were there?”

Louis takes a minute to think about it. “Three months, I think?”

Zayn laughs.

“What?” Louis asks, but he’s laughing too. “It’s a bit ridiculous, I know, but it makes me feel a little better. Like, I don’t need no man.”

That’s what sets Harry off, and Louis tries to pout even as he’s shaking with the force of Harry’s laughter.

“Okay, that’s it! Tomorrow we’re all taking a trip to my place, and you can see how great I am at decorating and just how _lived-in_ it is!”

“Why not tonight?” Zayn asks, but Harry already knows and he squeezes Louis tighter when he says, proudly, “Tonight I’ve got a date with Harry’s cock.”

There’s a strangled yell from the kitchen, along with a few cabinets slamming, and Harry giggles, leaning in to bite Louis’ shoulder, when Liam yells, “You’re not the only people in this apartment!”

“Don’t I know it, Payne!” Louis yells back.  Harry lightly swats Louis’ thigh.

“Stop antagonizing him,” he says. Louis frowns.

“But it’s so much _fun_.”

Harry tries his absolute hardest not to smile, but judging by the crinkles by Louis’ eyes, he fails miserably. “You’re a horrible person.”

“You love me,” Louis says, and Harry wants to contradict him but he absolutely can’t, so he just nods and says, “Yeah,” breathlessly before kissing him.

Harry and Louis and Liam meet Niall and Zayn for lunch at the pub the next day, and then they all get on the tube and head to Louis’ flat. Harry used to spend a night or two a week there, back when he’d first moved in, but Louis never had any food and the commute was longer and they were forever going to the pub and hanging out with Liam _anyway_ , so it’d made more sense for Louis to keep staying over with Harry. Harry hadn’t ever really thought it was weird, though Zayn does bring up a good point when he asks, “Why d’you keep paying rent on two flats if you’re never there?”

Louis kind of shrugs and avoids answering, but Harry notices a thoughtful frown on Liam’s face.

He’s thought about asking Louis to move in, of course he has. You don’t propose without thinking about living together first, but Harry has never gotten up the courage to ask Liam if Louis could move in officially. He’s just always the tiniest bit afraid that Liam will say no.

But this look on Liam’s face right now seems promising, like maybe he thinks it’s stupid to pay rent on an empty flat, too.

The second they get off the tube, Louis’s playing the role of tour guide, pointing out all his favorite takeaway shops, which were basically his only form of sustenance whenever Harry left him to his own devices. Of course, it’s been a while since Louis has been here, and his neighborhood has a quick turnover, so there’s a lot of, “That place has the best curry – wait – I think that’s a pet shop now, sorry, dunno when that happened.” Niall keeps alternating between laughing at Louis getting slightly flustered and being disappointed that the food all seems to be gone.

Then they get to Louis’ apartment, and he throws open the door with a flourish and –

It’s a Chinese restaurant.

Zayn immediately bursts out laughing and Niall exclaims, “All _right_!” and heads to the nearest empty table, snagging a menu on the way. Harry’s first thought is that now Louis can move in, guilt free, and his second thought is for the _legality_ of Louis not knowing that his apartment was suddenly a restaurant.

Louis looks completely dumbfounded. “I don’t understand.”

And that’s when a waiter comes from behind the curtain that leads to Louis’ kitchen (Harry certainly hopes that they’ve upgraded that, since Harry remembers a stove with only two working burners and an oven that only worked as a broiler) and excitedly says, as if he recognizes him, “Louis!”

Harry sits down with Louis and the manager for less than fifteen minutes before he’s fairly certain that Louis has no legal footing to speak of: an oral lease agreement, notices to vacate the premises sent through the mail that Louis hasn’t picked up in months, and a landlady who has disappeared completely. They each grab a couple boxes of Louis’ stuff – Harry physically dragging Niall away from his table, marveling at the fact that they _just ate_ – and take it back to Harry and Liam’s, where they pile them next to the couch and then all just sit there, hardly believing the turn the day took.

Louis is despondent and barely seems to notice when Harry rubs soothing circles onto his back.

“My flat is a Chinese place,” he says in a flat tone. “I have to find a new place to live.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Liam speaks up. “You’ll live with us.”

Everyone stops and looks at Liam. Harry and Louis are disbelieving, Zayn looks slightly out of place, and Niall’s eyes are wide.

“Really?” Harry asks. Liam shrugs.

“I don’t see why not. He’s already over here most of the time, anyway. Now he’ll just have to pay rent.”

Louis hops up and jumps into Liam’s lap, throwing his arms around his neck. Harry only takes half a second before he’s jumping up and wrapping his arms around both of them.

“Thanks, Li,” Louis whispers into their pile of limbs, so only Liam and Harry can hear it.

“Of course, Lou,” Liam says, almost as quietly, and Harry’s heart is so full it feels like it could almost burst.

They order in food (“Anything but Chinese,” Louis says, long-suffering, a hand over his eyes. Zayn suggests Thai with a wicked smile, and Louis glares but agrees) and spend the rest of the evening sitting around the apartment. Louis opens up a couple of boxes and pulls everything out of them slowly, exclaiming over each item and setting them on the floor in a circle around the boxes. Liam eyes the circle with something like distaste, but Harry just wraps a hand around the back of Louis’ neck and says something about having an unpacking party in the next few days, and Liam looks appeased.

Liam starts yawning about half past one, and even as Louis is laughing at him for being old and boring, his eyes look tired, so Harry takes it upon himself to kick Niall and Zayn out and hold out a hand to take Louis to bed.

“But I’m not _tired_ ,” Louis whines, and Harry just grins at him.

“I can think of a few things to tire you out,” he says, and Louis pretends to be shocked.

“I have no idea what you’re suggesting, young Harold, but I’m sure whatever it is is far too crass for my delicate sensibilities.”

Harry rolls his eyes, pulls Louis off the couch, and throws him over his shoulder. “We’ll try to keep it down,” he says to Liam, even as Louis is beating on his back and yowling like a cat.

Liam just waves a hand. “Celebrate or whatever you’ve got to do, I’ll put my loudest headphones on.”

Harry leans over, as awkward as it is to do so (Louis takes the opportunity to pinch directly underneath his ass), and kisses Liam on the forehead. “Just the best flatmate ever,” he says, and then waves and sweeps Louis out of the room.

“Let me down right this _second_ , I absolutely _refuse_ to be manhandled, I still have my _dignity_ ,” Louis says as Harry kicks his – _our_ , he thinks, _our bedroom now_ , and his smile gets even bigger – door shut behind them.

“Calm down, you big baby,” Harry says, unceremoniously dropping Louis onto the bed, where he bounces and yelps.

“That’s it,” Louis says, trying his absolute hardest to frown, even as Harry’s crawling over his body up to his mouth, “I’m moving out.”

“Lou?” Harry says quietly, face right over Louis’, arms holding himself up on either side of Louis’ shoulders.

“Hmm?” Louis hums, his eyes sparkling when he looks away from Harry’s mouth into Harry’s eyes.

“Shut up.”

“Yes, si – “ but Harry kisses him before he can even get the entire smartass comment out of his mouth, and so he just laughs into Harry’s mouth instead. Harry grins and kisses Louis’ chin, before starting to unbutton Louis’ shirt. He’s kissing each new section of skin as he exposes it when he’s reminded of a song lyric. He tries his hardest not to laugh out loud when he murmurs, “One moment I was tearing off your blouse, now you’re living in my house.”

“Oh, shut up,” Louis says, but it’s impossibly fond, and when Harry looks up at him from under his lashes, his face is incredibly soft. “I can’t believe you’re trying to seduce me with a lyric by The 1975.”

“I do believe it’s working,” Harry says, nipping at the skin of Louis’ stomach with his teeth softly, making Louis jump. He brings one hand up to tangle in Harry’s curls.

“I’ve been gone for you for years,” is all he says, so quietly Harry almost misses it.

“Same here,” Harry says. He’s finished unbuttoning Louis’ shirt, so he pushes it off of his torso and rests his head on Louis’ lap, one thumb hooked into the waist of Louis’ trousers. “I’m so glad you’re here to stay.”

“Forever and always, Haz.” Louis trails one finger down Harry’s cheek; Harry hums and closes his eyes, content. “Forever and always.”

Harry wakes up early the next morning, mouth full of Louis’ hair and his arm half asleep where Louis’ head is resting on it. The rest of Louis is thrown over Harry’s body, legs tangled together and arm resting on Harry’s stomach. Harry has woken up exactly like this more times than he can count in the last ten years, and now he and Louis are _officially_ engaged and _officially_ living together, and he can see himself waking up exactly like this for the rest of his life. He grins, and squeezes Louis to him just a little bit tighter.

“What’re you so happy about, it’s dead early,” Louis mutters into Harry’s chest.

“Just thinking about how much I love you,” Harry says. Louis raises his head just enough to level a look at Harry.

“You are a gigantic sap, why do I sleep with you?”

Harry angles himself just so he can kiss the tip of Louis’ nose. “Because you love me just as much.”

“Oh, right,” Louis says softly, rearranging them so he can lazily kiss Harry until they’re both properly awake. Eventually, though, Louis has to duck out of bed to get ready for work. Harry pouts for about a minute before he decides to join Louis in the shower, where they make _just_ enough noise to get Liam to pound on the door and yell, "Other people use the shower, too!" which makes Louis laugh so hard he swallows a bunch of water and has to jump out of the shower before he chokes.

Louis moves in over the next few days, quietly but quickly. Harry never manages to arrange that unpacking party, but every time he comes home, something new of Louis' has appeared. It always makes Harry have to swallow back that grin he gets around Louis, the one that makes Liam rolls his eyes and Niall pretend to throw up at how cute they are. He is especially happy one morning when he walks into the kitchen to make tea and discovers that Liam's rusty old kettle has been replaced by Louis' fancy new one, the one Harry bought him for Christmas last year that he's complained about missing on a regular basis since. Anytime Harry suggested that he, you know, bring it over to use, Louis would just scowl and say, "I need a kettle at _my_ place, Harry, honestly, I can't believe you'd even suggest such a thing."

Louis' kettle is really much better than the one Liam's had since before uni, and Harry's able to boil water that doesn't have rust flakes or a red tint to it and he really honestly doesn't even spare a thought for Liam's kettle until Liam walks out of the kitchen, holding it up with a look on his face that for Liam is downright _murderous_.

"Why aren't we using my kettle?" he asks demandingly. "It's a perfectly good one!"

Harry frowns. "Well, Lou's brought his over," he says slowly. "And it's not rusted through and boils much faster."

"Who _cares_ how fast it boils? That was one of the best things about my kettle, you had enough time for a quick shower while it was working!"

"Yeah, and now we have enough time for a shower after a cuppa. It's not the end of the world, Li. You can still use your kettle if you want, but I think Lou's is just better."

Liam frowns, but sighs and nods. "Yeah, I guess we could get rid of mine, it's really not very good."

"You sure? I know how much you like your tea rust-flavored."

Liam smiles at him. "Don't be smart, Haz."

"Can't help it, 's just how I am." He grins, now that Liam is smiling, and assumes that's the end of it.

He does bring it up with Louis later - it is part of his day, after all - and Louis seems to think it might be something to worry about.

"D'you think he doesn't want me here anymore? He's been really weird lately. He labeled his food," he says, pointing out the large _LIAM_ scrawled on the package of bread they're using to make sandwiches.

"That is a bit unlike him," Harry says, remembering the way Liam had taken to carrying around extra pens for Harry by the second day they'd met. "But he suggested you move in. 'Sides, he loves you."

"Maybe he's having second thoughts," Louis says darkly.

"But he hasn't _said_ anything about it."

"When has Liam ever outright said anything that's been bothering him? You know him, he'll do something big and passive-aggressive to goad _you_ into saying something. And then you won't, and I'll be forced to say something, and it'll be a whole big thing." Louis sighs.

Harry frowns. "I don't think that's going to happen."

"Whatever you say," Louis says, disbelievingly, but he does drop it.

Harry starts to notice Liam acting weirdly after that. He's sighing a bit more at things Louis says, making a big show of moving around Louis' belongings to get to what he needs, writing his name on his toothpaste _and_ toothbrush, which seems to Harry a bit like overkill, but it's nothing _too_ bad.

At least, that is, until Harry's alone in the flat one day and has to sign for a delivery of a large non-functioning red phone booth. It's not just large, it's actually _massive_ , at least half a foot taller than Harry and somehow half the length of the couch, and Harry doesn't quite understand how it even fits in their flat, let alone how they're supposed to coexist with this giant not-working _thing_ in their living room. He keeps thinking about it and worrying about knocking into it on the way into the kitchen and by the time Liam gets home Harry is positively _seething_.

"Your giant phone booth came today," he says when the door opens. He assumes he's saying it to Liam, because he can't actually _see the door_ around this massive thing, but Louis is at art class with Zayn so he's reasonably sure this could only be Liam.

He's proven right when Liam drops his bag on the floor and exclaims, "Oh, _wicked_ , it's here!"

For just a moment Harry wonders if maybe this is related to Liam's job somehow, like maybe Liam plans to create an entire building based around this phone booth. "Do you need this for work, maybe?" he asks.

"No, I just saw one on the street one day and thought I'd quite like to have one in the flat. It's great, isn't it?" Liam beams at Harry, one hand still reverently ghosting over the thing. Harry sighs.

"Don't you think it's a little…big?"

"That's what I like about it! It'll be a good conversation piece, yeah?"

"I think we'd probably be able to have more conversations if we could fit more than two people in our place at one time, actually."

Liam frowns. "You don't like it."

"I didn't say _that_ , it's just." Harry sighs. "It's so massive, Li, it's something we probably should have talked about before you put it in the flat?"

"A lot of stuff has just been popping up around the flat lately," Liam grumbles. "I thought that's just what we were doing now."

Harry feels like he's been pulled up short. "Are you talking about _Louis_? My fiancé, who you _suggested_ move in?"

"Yes, move in, not take over! I never imagined he'd come with so much _stuff_."

Harry frowns, looking around at the flat, which honestly hadn't started to feel crowded until the phone booth showed up. And then his eyes alight on their swords, still lying against the wall where Louis and Zayn had propped them after their impromptu sword fight.

"I tell you what," he says, picking up one of the swords. "I'll fight you for it. I win, you send this thing back." He hits the side of the phone booth with the sword, making Liam hiss at the possible scratch in the paint and a very loud clanging noise that rings through the flat.

Liam picks up the other sword. "And if I win?"

Harry shrugs. "I'll talk to Lou about scaling back his stuff, maybe. Or we'll start looking for a place of our own."

Liam looks a little sad at that, but nods and gets into position, just like Louis had the other day. Harry grins.

"Hope this is as fun as it looks," he says, mimicking Liam's pose, and then they're off.

There's a lot of clanging at first, simple blocks and parries, and then Harry is crowding Liam towards one side of the room, both of them smiling.

"You know," Liam says, using his other hand to help hold the sword away from himself, as Harry is pushing his own toward him, "I really don't mind Louis being here. I just -" he grunts as he manages to push Harry off him and starts fighting him back across the room- "feel like you're pushing me out, almost?"

"We could never do that," Harry says through little pants of exertion. He swipes his sword over Liam's head, who grins and nods toward Harry's feet. Harry obediently jumps up when Liam swings his sword under them. "We love you too much."

"Yeah, but we can't all live together forever, you know?"

Harry gets the upper hand again, and starts moving them towards the middle of the room. He mainly wants to clang his sword against that dumb phone booth again. "We can certainly try," he says.

Liam grins. "Yeah, that wouldn't be weird at all." He checks behind him just in time to see he's about to run into the booth. He shoots a look at Harry and then thrusts hard enough to get Harry to move backwards. Harry actually has to jump out of the way of the sword tip, and then he realizes he's close enough to the coffee table and  he might as well jump up.

He leaps up with both feet, arms out, angling the sword over his chest, and grins at the awed look on Liam's face. It did feel rather impressive. He waggles his eyebrows at Liam, and then moves to attack. Liam blocks it, also pretty impressively, and then counters with a move of his own that makes Harry have to shuffle back on the table. They move like that a few more times, shuffling back and forth, when suddenly the door opens and Harry glances up to see Louis (because he can see over the phone booth at this height) and doesn't pay attention to his feet and trips and the sword goes flying and -

And that's how they end up in the A&E waiting room at ten o'clock on a Wednesday night. Harry can't do anything but stare at the floor and mutter, "I stabbed him. I stabbed Louis. I stabbed my fiancé."

Niall, who'd shown up at the bar while everyone else, including Zayn, was waiting outside for a taxi, reaches over Liam to rub Harry's back and says, in a reassuring voice that's somehow still bubbling with amusement, "Aw. Do you really think he's still your fiancé?"

Zayn, on the other side of Niall, hits his shoulder reproachingly but can't manage to keep the gleam out of his own eye. Harry sighs and hunkers down more, almost managing to put his head between his legs.

"It'll be all right, Haz," Liam says softly, sliding an arm around Harry's shoulders.

Harry just shakes his head and repeats, "I stabbed Louis. With a _sword_."

Liam's saved from having to answer by a nurse walking over to them and saying dryly, with a quick glance to her chart, "Mr. Tomlinson is asking to see Curly the Clumsy and Payne the Passive Aggressive."

Zayn stifles a laugh in his hand while Niall bursts out with a big belly laugh, and Harry shoots them both glares as he follows the nurse and Liam into Louis' curtained-off little area. He moans a little when he finally catches sight of Louis, shirtless with a large white bandage covering his entire right shoulder. He zips over to him, quick as he can, and tentatively touches Louis' right hand.

"Are you okay?"

"Am I _okay_?" Louis repeats, incredulous. "Tomorrow, I'm going to have to tell my kids - the ones I teach not to run with scissors - that my fiancé ran me through with a bloody sword!"

"Well," Harry says, fidgeting just a little, "technically, I didn't 'run you through'-"

"I'm sorry," Louis says, holding up one hand to interrupt, "is this a discussion of the _degree_ to which you stabbed me?!"

Harry opens his mouth to say something, but Louis shakes his head. "What were you even doing sword-fighting anyway?"

Harry glances at Liam.

"It looked like fun when you and Zayn did it," Liam says, his voice rising at the end and turning the statement into a question. Louis shakes his head.

"But Zayn and I don't frequently trip over our own feet," Louis says, looking right at Harry, who can feel his cheeks heating up.

"It was - we were," Harry stumbles over his words, and Louis just raises his eyebrows at him expectantly. Harry looks at Liam again, who sighs and says, "We were fighting for the flat."

"What." Louis says flatly, looking from Liam to Harry. "What does that mean?"

Harry shrugs. "Whoever won the sword fight got to keep living in the flat, sort of. Or, really, if I won Liam had to send that godawful phone booth back -"

Louis looks at Liam and just says, "We'll talk about that monstrosity later."

"- and if Liam won, you and I were going to start looking for a new place. Well, when we got married, at least."

"Well, that's dumb," Louis says. "You and I were always going to look for a new place after we got married."

"Yeah - wait, what?" Harry asks, looking at Louis, completely dumbfounded. Louis shrugs.

"We can't live in that flat with our best friend forever, Harry. We need to grow up and move out. Live in a place that's just ours, you know?" Louis turns over the hand that Harry is still lightly touching and laces their fingers together, eyes meeting Harry's. "A place we find and make home _together_. A place where we can raise our kids."

Harry's been slowly smiling while Louis has been talking, and at the mention of kids he drops Louis' fingers and takes his face in his hands. "Yeah," he breathes, "a place for our kids," and then he kisses Louis.

Liam clears his throat a little awkwardly and says, "I'll just go, yeah?"

Louis pulls away from Harry just enough so Harry can see his grin and says, "Yes, please," before leaning into him again. Before Liam walks too far, though, Louis breaks away again to add, "That phone booth better be gone by the time I get back!"

"Absolutely," Liam says, and Harry grins and goes back to kissing Louis.

 

-

 

 

Zayn has never really been one to have too many friends. Not because he _can't_ ; he always had someone to hang with in school, and has really never had trouble finding a party to attend on a quiet night, but honestly he's just…never really been that into other people. No one really seemed to understand him, or hold his interest for long enough to really get that close.

At least, until he met Louis.

Now, it's been three months of Louis, and Louis' fiancé, and Louis' friends, and Zayn has slowly started to think of everyone as _his_ friends now, too, and he always has someone to hang out with every night. He's even managed to get himself almost arrested while hanging out with Niall, which everyone agrees is a true sign that he's one of the gang now.

Anyway, it's all very different from how Zayn's life was before, but he doesn't really think he'd trade it for the world, not now he knows that Louis has _also_ always wanted to buy a van and paint it like in Scooby Doo and call it the Mystery Machine, which, really, is one of the weirder things Zayn has ever let himself admit out loud.

Louis ends up having to spend two weeks recuperating from his stab wound – “my fiancé actually _stabbed_ me, Zayn, can you believe it? I was stabbed with a sword, like I’m in the bloody _Game of Thrones_ or something,” he says one night, moaning on Zayn’s couch while they watch TV, his feet in Zayn’s lap, something that none of any of Zayn's friends have ever tried before, but that he finds incredibly wonderful.

“I don’t think anyone on _Game of Thrones_ has been stabbed,” Zayn says thoughtfully. “I think it’s just a bunch of beheadings and dragon fire and stuff. Oh, wait, I think the little girl stabbed someone once.”

Louis’ only response is to moan louder, the back of one hand on his forehead like a Victorian woman on a fainting couch – and that means he can’t paint or visit art class, so in solidarity Zayn stays home with him.

They end up spending most of their time talking, learning more about each other than just _what do you do_ and _what's your family like_. Louis' so _upfront_  about everything, from his strained relationship with his ex-stepfather to his favorite features of Harry's body, that Zayn finds himself actually opening up for once (though within reason - there's still that six-month period of his life he pretends never happened). Louis, to his credit, doesn't make a big deal about anything, not even Zayn's story about wanting to stay in the closet longer, because he was already known as _that Muslim kid_ at school, and really didn't want to be _that gay Muslim kid._ Louis just squeezes his hand and tells him a story about the time Liam and Harry decided to drive up to Manchester one weekend in uni, Liam insisting they use back roads the whole way, so they got hopelessly, ridiculously lost in a freak snowstorm, which resulted in them having to cuddle for warmth in the car - directly outside an inn. By the time Louis gets to the end of the story, imitating the flustered way Liam always tells it, he's almost laughing too hard for Zayn to make out his words, and that's - that's the only problem Zayn has with hanging out with Louis. Not the laughing, obviously, the laughing is his favorite thing, what he most looks forward to when he knows he's going to see Louis.

No, it's the Liam thing.

Zayn's still not sure how he feels about Liam - the whole "I'm in love with you" incident was obviously too much too fast, and the first few times he saw Liam after that were awkward, with Liam looking at Zayn just a touch too intensely, but he's since mellowed out, which means Zayn relaxes more, and it's started to be nice. Liam's funny in a quiet, dorky way - he once said he doesn't like pineapples because he doesn't trust their motives, and that launched the whole gang into a discussion of that time Liam got majorly, spectacularly drunk, called Cher at the pub a vampire, broke his ankle by dancing on a table, and woke up alone with a pineapple in his bed. The story is probably Zayn's favorite that he's ever heard, and even if he feels a little weird that Liam apparently got drunk to get his mind off someone he was obsessed with - no one's mentioned specifics, but he wouldn't be surprised to learn the timing matches up so the whole incident's about him - the way everyone in the group participates in the telling of the story just makes him that much happier that he found this particular assortment of blokes to be friends with.

Also, Zayn keeps finding himself oddly, like, _touched_ , spending so much time with someone who's been part of a couple for ten years with no sign of slowing down. Louis just seems so _content_ , even as he's doing things like canceling on Zayn because Harry's had a bad day and Louis needs to console him or, like right now, murmuring happy little nothings into his phone, even though they left Harry at the pub less than thirty minutes ago. It makes something in Zayn's chest ache, which has never happened before.

"How did you and Harry meet?" Zayn asks when Louis hangs up. Louis laughs, a single, solitary chuckle, and smiles so wide his eyes practically crinkle shut in the corners. "It's a funny story, actually. We met in the bathroom.”

Zayn can't help it - he can feel his eyes go wide. "You mean…?" he half-asks, and Louis cocks his head in confusion for just a moment before his own eyes widen.

"Oh Jesus Christ, Malik, we didn't meet in a _bathhouse_. We met in uni, in the dorm bathrooms. He was brushing his teeth in only his pants, and he was long and lean and absolutely gorgeous, and this is gonna sound _unbearably_ cheesy but he caught my eye in the mirror and something just…clicked." Louis shrugs, looking not the tiniest bit embarrassed when he adds, "And that was it. I was a goner. I would say we've had our ups and downs but we _haven't_ , honestly."

"Not even about what you were going to do after uni?" Zayn's never really had a serious relationship, but every couple he knew at university didn't make it out unscathed. "I mean, you didn't always want to be a primary school teacher, did you?"

Louis shakes his head. "No, not really. I didn't really think about what happens _after_ school while I was in it, so I wasn't, like, thinking about work ever. Just before graduation one of my professors suggested I apply for this job, and Haz had so much more school and it was near him and it just seemed perfect. I was never really going to make it as like a famous artist or summat, y'know? Like, I'm okay, but I'm not great. Not like you." He smiles at Zayn, and Zayn can't help but smile back, even as he feels himself needing to _push_ , just a little more.

“So you’re only here for Harry?”

Louis sighs, then gives Zayn a soft smile, something that may be pity in his eyes. “Do you want to know my absolute favorite story about Harry?”

Zayn nods, not sure where this is going.

“A year and a half before we met, before he’d ever decided to go to university in London or anything like that, he went to a concert in Manchester, The Script. It was a good show, they did all their best songs and the crowd was so good they even had two encores. D’you know how I know that?”

“Because Harry told you?” Zayn guesses, but he knows somehow he’s wrong.

Louis shakes his head, his smile going impossibly fond. “Because I was there too. We didn’t meet there, obviously, but Harry and I were always meant to meet, meant to be together, so it’s not a sacrifice or anything, giving up things that may or may not have worked out for something that definitely, absolutely has.”

“Oh,” is all Zayn can say, quietly. Louis knocks his fist on Zayn’s shoulder gently, and smiles when he looks up at him.

“Wanna play some FIFA?”

Later, while they’re both sitting in front of the TV, controllers in hands, Louis says, “Sometimes I do think about what might have been, you know? If I’d done what everyone said I should’ve, and broken up with Haz right out of school and, I dunno, gone to Paris or summat, tried to be a proper artist, even if it was only for a little while.”

Zayn doesn’t pause playing but does say, “And?”

Louis shrugs. “And it’s in the past, isn’t it? Nothing I can do about it now.”

Zayn might be imagining the slight sense of longing to Louis’ voice, but either way he can’t seem to get it off his mind for the next few weeks. He finds himself almost always watching Harry and Louis interact, looking for signs that maybe one or the both of them aren’t actually _in it_ all the way, but absolutely nothing is different – they still both seem to light each other up from the inside, even giggling and hanging off of each other when they do something as simple as get another round for the table.

“Like what you see?” a voice asks in Zayn’s ear, and he jumps and looks away from Harry and Louis at the bar to see Niall smirking at him.

“What?” Zayn asks faux-innocently.

“You’re always staring at those two lately. I’m just trying to decide if you’re in love with Haz, Lou, or if you’re just a sap like poor Liam and ‘in love with love,’ or whatever.” He puts actual air quotes around the phrase, one hand still holding his beer bottle, and rolls his eyes.

“In love with love, I guess?” Zayn asks rather than says, and Niall groans.

“The worst possible answer!” he exclaims, leaning over and clutching his stomach like he’s dying.

“Or what about, none of the above?”

Immediately, Niall sits back up properly. “Much better,” he says approvingly, nodding.

Zayn grins. “No, I’ve never really been a big believer in love, myself. Except for, like, these two,” he says, waving at where Harry and Louis are fucking _gazing fondly_ at each other, even while Cher loudly puts their drinks right in front of them, rolling her eyes, “I’ve never actually seen a proper relationship, you know?”

Niall nods again. “Ya, those two are a freak of nature or something. Li keeps thinking he’s going to find a relationship like that. That’s probably what messed you two up.”

Zayn almost chokes on his beer at the casual way Niall says that; it’s _true_ , obviously, but no one’s had the balls to actually say that _to_ Zayn since it happened.

Niall laughs, and reaches over to slap Zayn on the back. “Y’alright there, mate?”

Zayn nods, starting to laugh himself. Niall grins.

“We should really hang out more, just the two of us.”

Zayn manages to swallow, get his breathing back to normal, and raises an eyebrow. “Thought you were straight?”

Niall shrugs. “Hey, a hot body is a hot body.”

Zayn bursts out laughing, and Niall continues.

“Nah, not like that. I just think you’d be fun to go out with. You smoke, right?”

Zayn nods.

“Yeah, so like, one of these days when everyone else is off being sappy and in love, we should get together. And whatever happens, happens.” Niall waggles his eyebrows.

“Yeah, mate, sounds good,” Zayn says, laughing again, and then suddenly Louis and Harry are back and Zayn forgets about it for a while.

He doesn’t forget about his conversation with Louis, though, to the point where when his boss offers him the company’s passes to a concert by The Script, for a minute he just thinks he’s misheard, too busy remembering how Harry and Louis had just missed meeting each other a full year and a half before they met, so he says, very eloquently, “Wait, what?”

Ben sighs, but his eyes are sparkling with amusement. “Not paying attention again, I see.”

“No, I was, I just – The Script, you said?”

Ben nods. “Perrie’s still out of town, and when I told her these came in, she said you might want to write the review for us? Get you a little more exposure, you know.”

Perrie is the music editor for the magazine where Zayn works, and his closest work colleague. He does spend most of the time they run into each other in the break room complaining about his little fluff pieces that never seem to, like, _help his career_ , but he hadn’t realized she was actually listening. He’ll have to finally take her out for those drinks they keep promising.

“Yeah, absolutely,” Zayn says, taking the passes and counting them – five, he couldn’t have planned it better himself – and then awkwardly, yet enthusiastically, shaking Ben’s hand. “Thanks so much for this opportunity.”

Ben arches one eyebrow and just says, “A thousand words in my inbox on Monday, please.”

Zayn nods and tries not to look too excited as Ben walks off, but he’s buzzing just a little as he slides into what he now thinks of as “their” booth in the pub later that night, next to Liam and across from Harry and Louis, and he grins with barely contained glee when Niall returns from the bar with five pints.

“Thanks, mate,” he says, and Niall laughs.

“’Course,” he says, own eyes sparkling with amusement. “What’s got you so excited?”

Zayn shrugs and takes a sip of his beer, the eyes of the whole gang on him. Liam nudges his shoulder with his own, and Zayn puts his glass down. “Okay, I’ve got a surprise.”

“No shit,” Louis says, rolling his eyes, but he’s smiling.

“It’s for you, wanker,” Zayn says fondly.

“What is it,” Louis immediately demands. “I hate being surprised, just give me the present.”

“Who said it was a present?”

Louis bounces in his seat and actually _whines_ , “Malik, come _on_.”

Zayn rolls his eyes. “Fine. What are your plans for this weekend?”

“I don’t know, what _are_ my plans for this weekend?”

“Well, if you’re not too busy, I was thinking you and Harry and Liam and Niall too would like to, maybe, go to The Script show with me?”

Harry’s eyes go wider than Zayn’s ever seen them and Louis lets out a little squeak that makes him slap his hands over his mouth and Niall laugh.

“How did – “ Harry starts to ask, and then shakes his head. “What?”

“The music editor at work is out of town, so I got the magazine’s passes to the show. I just have to write a review by Monday morning and we get to go.”

“That’s more than you’ve been doing, right?” Liam asks, and Zayn turns to look at him, smiling softly.

“Yeah, it’s actually a really good opportunity for me, too. But when I heard what the show was, I immediately thought of you two,” he says, turning back to Harry and Louis. Louis has dropped his hand and is now just staring, open-mouthed and fond, at Zayn.

“You thought of _us_?” Harry says, one hand coming up to rub at Louis’ shoulder almost absent-mindedly.

Zayn shrugs, suddenly feeling a little self-conscious. “I thought maybe it’d be cool for you and Louis to get to go to a Script show, you know, actually together.”

“That’s –“ Louis starts, his voice rough with emotion. He clears his throat and says, “that’s incredibly nice of you, Zayn. And yeah, I think we’d all like to go, right, lads?”

“Hmm, I dunno if I’m up for a full night of the two of you looking even _more_ smugly in love than usual,” Niall says, and Louis pulls back and punches Niall’s arm so hard he almost falls out of his chair. “On the other hand,” he continues, voice full of pain, his other arm rubbing his sore shoulder, “I’m sure it could be a fun show.”

They all meet at the pub (of course they do) on Saturday night, where Niall makes everyone take a shot before he lets them out to the show. Everyone’s excited – it’s actually the first time they’ve hung out, all five of them, outside of the pub or their own flats, if you include Louis’ Chinese restaurant as a flat. At least, that’s why Zayn’s excited – Niall has already expressed his desire to try and pull by the end of the night, and told an almost uncomfortable Liam that he’ll be expected to pull too.

Harry and Louis, of course, are on a whole other level. They link arms when they take their shots, like a couple eating cake at their wedding (“just practicing for the real thing,” Louis says when Liam points this out, eyes shining. “Only two and a half months now!”

“Should I smash this in your face then?” Harry asks, trying not to laugh.

“Don’t you dare. If you smash cake in my face during our wedding, Harold, I will divorce you on the _spot_.”

“Liar,” Harry says softly, looking at Louis’ lips, and then Zayn looks away, because he’s seen enough of them being sappy for the night and it’s barely gotten started). They sing songs by The Script back and forth during the entire cab ride to the show, and when Zayn catches Liam’s eye he just shakes his head and rolls his eyes fondly.

Zayn actually seems to catch Liam’s eye a lot during the night. Niall disappears within minutes of them arriving, claiming he’s off to find the bar, and Louis and Harry are completely enthralled with the band and each other; Louis stands in front of Harry with his arms wrapped around Harry’s waist, Harry’s chin on Louis’ shoulder. So really, it makes sense that Zayn keeps watching Liam, who always smiles when he catches him. It’s nice. Liam is clearly enjoying himself; he doesn’t really stop moving the entire concert, and Zayn finds that ridiculously endearing, even as he’s refusing to do more than bob his head to the music.

Niall shows up half an hour before the show is over and pulls Liam away, claiming he’s found the perfect guy for him; Liam grumbles that he probably just needs a wingman, but goes with him anyway, and Zayn –

Well, Zayn feels a stab of jealousy that he’s not really expecting.

Something must flash across his face, and Louis must see it or something, because the next time they find themselves alone – during a break in their next art class, Zayn smoking and Louis leaning against the wall next to him – Louis brings up Liam, almost immediately.

“Did you know,” Louis starts, eyes on the cigarette in Zayn’s hand, “that Liam met Niall for the first time in a bathroom, too?”

“Oh, yeah?” Zayn asks, exhaling smoke, and Louis’ eyes snap up to meet his and he smiles.

“Yeah. Harry and I were convinced they were going to fall in love just like us, because who meets in a _bathroom_ unless you’re destined to be together, or at least have some really great sex, right? But no,” and Louis sighs heavily, like all the world’s on his shoulders, dropping his gaze to the ground, “Niall is tragically heterosexual and Liam lives to look for love another day.”

Zayn grins and looks at the ground too and tries to contain the tightness in his chest of Liam actually _finding_ love somewhere, which, that’s pretty weird. Shouldn’t he want his friends to be happy? He flicks his gaze back up to Louis just in time to see a considering look on his face, but it passes quickly and Zayn forgets all about it.

Or at least, he tries to.

 

-

 

 

Niall has only been coming to Lloyd’s most every night for the last four years; how can he have slept with _all_ the women here already?

“Don’t new people move to London all the time?” Niall asks Demi the Waitress when she stops by where he’s sitting at the bar to pick up her next order. She raises her eyebrows at him.

“Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I did. Why?” she asks. Niall groans.

“I think I have slept with _every woman here_.”

Demi rolls her eyes and walks off with her tray of drinks without another word. Niall shrugs and leans back against the bar to give the whole place another once over. This time, his gaze lingers over the group in the back corner, artfully dressed and overwhelmingly male, which is why he didn't pay attention the first time. Now, however, the brunet laughing with the girl with light pink hair turns around and Niall realizes just who it is.

"Zayn!" he calls, waving wide with one arm, and when Zayn's eyes light up in recognition, Niall picks up his pint and makes his way over to him.

"Alright?" Zayn asks when Niall reaches him, eyes sparkling in that way that means maybe he's just the right side of tipsy. Niall wraps his free arm around Zayn's shoulders in a loose hug, holding his pint safely aloft in the other hand.

"Yeah, man. What're you doin' here? Cheatin' on your friends?" Niall winks. Zayn laughs, his face scrunching up.

"Nah, mate, just chillin' with a few people from work, you know."

The girl with light pink hair wraps her arms around Zayn's neck from behind, laying her head on his shoulder. Zayn rests one hand on both of hers on his chest, face fond. "Who's this?" she asks.

"Niall Horan," Niall answers before Zayn can open his mouth, extending one hand for her to shake. "At your service." He winks, and when she gives him her hand, he kisses her knuckles.

She snorts. "Cheeky, aren't we."

Niall waggles his eyebrows. "Is it working?"

She grins. "Nope!" She kisses Zayn on the cheek and says, "I'll leave you to it, yeah? Good work this week, love. I'm off to annoy Ben." She literally skips off and throws her arms around another, taller man; Zayn watches her go and laughs.

"I like her," Niall announces, and she glances back at him for just a second, rolling her eyes but smiling when he winks at her again. "Who is she?"

"That's Perrie," Zayn says. "She's the music editor at the magazine. She's why we got those passes to that concert a few weeks ago."

"Yeah? What'd she mean, good work this week?"

Zayn's cheeks tint the tiniest bit pink and he ducks his head. "Actually, I've been writing for her this week? It's a little bit of a promotion."

Niall slaps Zayn on the back. "Good on ya, mate! We should go out to celebrate!"

Zayn laughs. "That's what I'm doing."

"Yeah, but I'm saying _we_ should go celebrate. Ditch these losers from work and we'll go out somewhere. Maybe to that new club that opened last week. What's it called? Tools?"

" _Jackhammer_ ," Zayn hisses, eyes darting to make sure his coworkers aren't listening, cheeks practically red now.

Whatever. Niall's actually straight; if he's not embarrassed talking about the new gay bar downtown, why should Zayn be?

"Right, Jackhammer. C'mon, I've never been your wingman. I'll for sure get you laid, it'll be sick."

Zayn looks torn, but Niall knows he wants to come, so he chugs the rest of his beer, sets his glass down, and grabs Zayn's wrist.

"Let's do this," he says, pulling Zayn towards the door.

Zayn waves and calls weakly, "See you Monday, I guess," towards his coworkers, who as a whole steadfastly ignore him, minus Perrie, who waves goodbye back. Niall _really_ likes her.

He keeps dragging Zayn towards the door, only stopping to say, to an absolutely _fit_ brunette by the door who _definitely_ wasn't there ten minutes ago, "I'll be back for you later."

"You can stay and talk to her if you want to," Zayn says when they get outside, but Niall holds up a hand and he shuts up. Good.

"No more protests. This is happening."

"Okay. I guess this is happening." Zayn sounds resigned, which isn't ideal, necessarily, but Niall'll take whatever he can get. He grins and throws out his arm for a taxi.

They get to the new club half an hour later, and Zayn's actually managed to lighten up. Some of that is probably the joint they shared in the alley after the taxi dropped them off; Zayn's been completely relaxed ever since, smiling serenely while Niall's dragged him down two side streets to get to the queue outside Jackhammer. He doesn't even protest when Niall skips the line, heading straight up to the bouncer, which he has expressed his discomfort with before. Niall is a genius, that's all there is to it.

He sweet talks the bloke into letting them in, of course he does, and then they're in the thick of everything, sweaty bodies pressed all around them. Personally it's not Niall's cup of tea, but he can see the appeal, if one were to appreciate that type of body up that close. It's a little hard to hear himself in here, but he's convinced his wingman skills are definitely up to the task of getting Zayn laid without talking. If nothing else, there's a great beat in the club. Niall can feel it in his bones, and he starts dancing and looking around for someone for Zayn.

He's pressed up against a slightly brawny dude, who looks a little bit like a superhero, when he looks around and spots Zayn edging towards the door, looking pale. Niall catches his eyes, mouths, "What's up?"

Zayn doesn't answer, just shakes his head and gestures behind him, eyes wide. "Sorry," he mouths, but he doesn't look it as he turns around and hightails it out of there. Niall looks around, completely bewildered, but then.

Oh, but then he gets an idea as to what Zayn's always so secretive about.

Niall gets to work the next day. He has a lot of contacts in a lot of weird places, and he never hesitates to use them for whatever he can. It means he's actually really good at giving gifts when he puts his mind to it, and it also means that when he gets an idea, he can shoot an e-mail off to one of his contacts in Sweden and within two days he's got a video file in his inbox that he cannot _wait_ to show to his friends.

He'd say "for once it's not porn," but this time, it definitely is. He thinks about forwarding the video to everyone, making the subject line something simple enough to fool even Louis - who’d stopped reading his e-mail forwards with the third dog throwing up on its owner - into clicking on it, but in the end, Niall knows he’d miss the looks on everyone’s faces when they saw Zayn’s gay porn video.

Because that’s what it is. Niall watched the first minute of the video, five fit guys (and Niall is straight, Niall is the straightest person he’s ever met, but anyone can see these lads are _fit_ ) on a king sized hotel bed, laughing embarrassedly at each other while an unseen interviewer asks them questions about their favorite qualities in girls. Niall’s watched a _lot_ of porn, so he’s accidentally seen his fair share of gay porn, and he knows, he _knows_ , that the rest of this video is about these boys “discovering” each other. It’s not just gay porn, it’s a gay porn _orgy_ ; Niall’s actually a bit impressed at Zayn for it, especially since Zayn is actually the most attractive one by far.

So Niall keeps thinking about it, and thinking about it, and then finally one day Zayn’s not at the pub when he shows up, but Harry and Louis and Liam are, and so he slides into the booth with his beer and immediately starts with, “I know exactly why Zayn was so weird when I took him to that gay club last week.”

“Could it be because he was _uncomfortable_ at a gay club with a straight bloke pushing him on people?” Louis asks, eyebrows raised judgmentally, but Niall just waves his hand.

“Nah, that’s not it. Our friend Zayn used to do gay - wait for it -,” he says, pausing for effect before finishing gleefully, “pornography!”

No one at the table reacts in any way. Louis actually looks at his nails, bored. Niall deflates, just a little.

“Think about it. Think about that face. That’s a face anyone would _love_ to corrupt. A bit like Liam’s, actually.”

Harry and Louis exchange a look. Liam blushes and shrinks in his seat.

“You’re _sure_ you’re straight?” Louis asks Niall for what’s probably the seven hundredth time since they met, which Louis always claims was Niall basically trying to pick Liam up in a men’s toilet. He _wasn’t_ , though, obviously; he was just trying to get Liam to help him pull a girl. He hadn’t even realized Liam was sometimes into blokes until he started mooning over a fit dude a few weeks later.

“One hundred and ten percent,” Niall answers Louis easily. “But back to the gay porn.”

“Zayn didn’t do _gay porn_ ,” Louis says with a snort. Harry frowns.

“It does seem a bit unlike him. He can be pretty shy.”

“Yeah, because he’s afraid someone will recognize him from his porn days!”

“This is a bit farfetched, even for you,” Liam says, and it’s Niall’s turn to frown.

“I’m tellin’ you. I can prove it to you, I’ve got a video.”

“You’ve got a _video_?” Liam asks, completely shocked.

Niall grins and nods proudly. “Yup!”

“And you’ve watched it? You _know_ it’s porn,” Louis says.

“Yup! Well, I watched the beginning - didn’t wanna invade Zayn’s privacy, you know - but there’s _no way_ it’s not. In fact,” he says, sitting up straighter as a thought hits him, “I will bet you one thousand - no, ten thousand - no, _one million pounds_ that our friend Zayn used to do gay porn.”

“What kind of jobs do you think we have, that we have a million pounds just sitting around?” Louis asks.

“Aha! So you _do_ think it’s true.”

Louis snorts again and hits Harry in the chest. “Of course not. Hazza, babe, bet him.”

“Or,” Harry says, “instead of betting money, we bet something worth even more.”

“What’s better than money?” Louis asks, but everyone ignores him. Niall leans in a little.

“Alright. I’m listening,” he says.

“How about we make it a…slap bet?”

Louis gasps and then claps his hands delightedly. Liam looks between Harry and Niall, confused.

“What’s a slap bet?”

“A slap bet, dear Liam,” Harry says, “is a bet between gentlemen, for _honor_. Instead of the winner of the bet receiving cash, he gets to deliver a slap on the loser.”

“ _And_ ,” Louis butts in, “there’s a slap bet commissioner, and they’re in charge of how many slaps and who actually wins and I wanna do it, I’m slap bet commissioner!” He finishes so quickly his words are practically running together, jumping up and down in excitement.

“No, hold on,” Niall says, because Harry has already lit up and high-fived Louis, both of them grinning. “You have to promise to be _fair_ , Lou. Y’can’t just give it to whoever you’re sleeping with this week.”

“ _This week_?” Louis repeats incredulously. “We’re _engaged_ , Ni.”

“Don’t remind me,” Niall says. “But c’mon, that just makes it worse. Are you really gonna let me slap your fiancé in the face?”

“If you’re right,” Louis says imperiously, “of course.”

Niall nods, satisfied. “Good. Let’s go watch the video right now. I can’t wait to slap you directly in the face.”

Niall slides out of the booth, and Harry and Louis are drinking the last of their drinks so they can do the same when Liam says, “Wait!”

When Niall looks over at him, he looks a little like he’s going to vomit - Niall feels a little for him, because there’s no way he’s not still in love with Zayn, and finding out the guy you’re mad for was once involved in a gay orgy on camera has got to be a little disappointing. Then again, Niall’s always wanted to sleep with a porn star, _plus_ it’d probably be really helpful for, like, seduction purposes.

“Shouldn’t we at least, I dunno, _ask_ Zayn why he was uncomfortable before we watch this - this video?” Liam asks, and Harry and Louis look thoughtful and nod and Niall sighs. He was so looking forward to slapping Harry in the face right now. Oh well. Hopefully the anticipation will make it better.

“Erm - how are we supposed to approach this?” Louis asks, and it’s a good question, though Niall is a fan of the direct approach.

“We just say, ‘Zayn, mate, is it true you were once an active participant in a gay porno’, he’ll say yes, I’ll slap Hazza, and we’ll all go home happy.”

“We are _not_ doing that,” Liam says.

“What if we just, like, mention going to the club again? Or even, like, a different one,” Harry says. “And if he doesn’t want to we can try to figure out why.”

“We _know_ why,” Niall says. Liam glares at him.

“We _don’t_ know why,” he says. “This could probably be a good way to figure it out, though.”

“Yeah. Good idea, Haz,” Louis says, one hand rubbing Harry’s shoulder. Harry looks incredibly proud and leans into Louis’ touch like a cat. Niall likes them and everything, but they’re pretty disgusting sometimes. Niall seriously can’t wait for Louis to tell him to slap Harry in the face.

Everyone agrees with Harry, though, that they should subtly try to figure out what was bugging Zayn before anyone gets to look at the video again, so the next time the five of them are at the pub in their normal booth, Liam says, “Hey, we should all go do something.”

“Like, away from Lloyd’s, you mean?” Zayn asks, and when Liam nods, he says, “Yeah, I’m down. What are you thinking of?”

“Someone at school was talking about this new club that opened last week,” Harry says, and Zayn goes just a little bit pale.

“Jackhammer?” he asks, and when Harry shakes his head he relaxes. Niall tries to catch someone’s, _anyone’s_ , eye, and only manages to catch Louis glaring at him slightly and shaking his head.

“No, I think this place had some really normal word as a name, like, Alright or something.”

That makes Niall perk up. “Okay?” he asks, and Liam frowns and says, “Yeah, how are we going to find it if we don’t know the name?”

“No, I’ve heard about this place! It’s called Okay, and it’s supposed to be absolutely wicked.”

“So, more than okay,” Harry says with a tiny little smirk like he thinks he’s funny. Louis laughs, of course, and Niall just ignores him.

“They’re supposed to have this absolutely sick deejay,” he says.

“Yeah, that could be fun,” Zayn says.

“It’s turning out to be one of the greatest dance clubs in all of London, I hope we can even get in,” Niall says, and Zayn pales again.

“A dance club, huh. Y’know, I just remembered I’ve actually got an article to write tonight. Sucks I won’t be able to go with you,” and he slips out of the booth and leaves the pub, pulling his cigarettes out of his pocket as he goes.

“So. it’s the dancing he doesn’t like,” Louis says, and Niall and Liam both nod.

“Wonder why,” Liam says.

“It’s pretty obvious,” Niall says. When everyone looks at him, he says, “He's afraid someone will recognize him. Because the gays are always good at dancing.”

“Jesus Christ, Ni, you know that’s not true, you’ve seen Harry try to dance,” Louis says.

“Yeah, I think it’s something else,” Liam says.

“Yeah, but what?” Harry asks.

“He’s embarrassed because he doesn’t know how?” Liam asks.

“He’s seen Harry dance too, though, he knows we don’t care,” Louis says.

“Maybe I should dance in front of him again, remind him.”

“Aw, babe,” Louis says, smiling fondly at Harry. “That’s a pretty dumb idea.”

“No, actually, that sounds good!” Liam says. “We can invite him over to our flat tomorrow and put on music or something. Have, like, a surprise dance party!”

“Yes!” Harry exclaims. Louis looks thoughtful.

“That’s not bad.”

Niall shakes his head slowly in disbelief. “I still say he’s ashamed of the gay porn. Maybe he _danced_ in it.”

Liam glares at him and Louis says, “Right. Well, instead of ambushing our friend with a potentially embarrassing video, let’s try this first, yeah?”

Niall grumbles. “Okay,” he says, but as the rest of the boys start talking about how, exactly, one goes about throwing a surprise dance party, Niall starts thinking about the best way to show the video to everyone. The middle of the party sounds like the best bet.

So of course, the next night, he shows up to Liam and Harry and Louis’ flat twenty minutes late, laptop in hand, and says to Harry, “Prepare to be slapped!”

“Niall, don’t even think about it,” Louis says, sounding positively murderous, but Niall just cackles and pulls up the video.

“Wait, what’s going on?” Zayn asks.

“No big deal, just gonna play this video I got from a friend in Sweden,” Niall says. Zayn blanches.

“Did you say ‘Sweden’?”

“Yeah, er, Niall’s got it into your head that he’s got a really, you know, _compromising_ video of you,” Liam says.

“From _Sweden_?” Zayn practically yelps, and Niall says, “Yep!” and presses play.

Zayn’s sat in the middle of a large, fluffy, white hotel room bed, two guys on either side of him, and they’re all being asked questions from a woman off-screen about their favorite qualities in girls. They keep kind of laughing and looking at each other, embarrassed, and finally the woman asks, “And are you sure you can’t think of anything you like better than girls?”

And all the guys look at each other and Niall pauses it.

“See?” he asks, cackling, and he stands up and slaps a delightfully slack-jawed Harry right in the face. Harry goes down beautifully, and Zayn asks, “What the _hell_ is going on?”

“I made a slap bet with Harry that you did gay porn, and I just won!” Niall says gleefully, since Liam is still staring at the paused computer screen, shocked, and Louis is trying to comfort Harry where he’s lying on the floor, hand on his wonderfully bright red cheek.

“Gay porn?” Zayn asks. Niall nods.

“No, this is much worse than gay porn.” He presses play again, and Zayn on screen opens his mouth and sings, “Well,” all long and drawn out and high, and all the boys jump up until they’re standing on the bed and start doing a choreographed dance, singing about their favorite things about girls, and how great girls are. The interviewer is finally shown, looking shocked at the sudden dancing, and then five girls suddenly appear around the bed and all the guys jump down, still singing but now dancing with the girls.

Four heads slowly turn to look at Zayn, who says dully, “I was a teenage pop star in Sweden,” and takes a sip of the beer he’s got in his hand.

Niall is suddenly so, so happy, so much happier than he ever thought he could be, especially since each of the guys gets a freeze frame shot with absolutely fucking _ridiculous_ names superimposed on them, and Zayn’s is apparently _Zayn Shimmer_. Oh, he is never going to stop taking the piss out of Zayn for this.

“Wait, how is that possible?” Louis asks. “Didn’t you grow up in Bradford?”

“I got discovered when I was sixteen,” Zayn says, still in a completely dull tone of voice. “I was put in a boy band called Rhythm Boyz - with a Z -“

“Oh, naturally,” Louis says.

“- to try and be the next *NSync. We were only big in Sweden, though.”

“This is,” Harry says slowly, “my new favorite thing about you.”

Niall wishes he could take part in making fun of Zayn, say something ridiculous, but he’s laughing so hard it _hurts_. “Rhy - Rhythym Boyz!” is all he can manage to get out, high pitched around his giggles.

“Guys, guys, Zayn’s rapping, Zayn’s rapping!” Liam says excitedly from in front of the computer, where he’s been watching the entire video. Everyone turns back to it, just in time to watch Zayn rap about how much he loves ladies. Niall is probably going to die he’s laughing so hard.

They all watch through the end of the video, and just as Liam is grinning and reaching to press play again, saying “We’ve got to watch this at least a dozen more times,” Louis says, “Wait, wait!”

Everyone looks at him - Niall starting to quiet down to little giggles, finally - and he continues, looking directly at Niall. “You slapped Harry,” he says slowly, “but you didn’t win the slap bet.”

That sobers Niall up completely.

“You didn’t uphold the sanctity of the slap bet,” Louis says.

“I should get a penalty slap,” Harry says, and Louis nods at him.

“Right! Harry, as the rightful winner of the slap bet, gets to lay one on _you_ , Niall, but he also gets -“ He takes a moment to think about it, and then he looks up and grins, and Niall has never been so scared in his life. Harry’s got monstrous hands, _plus_ Louis’ got a bit of a mean streak and Niall was definitely not holding back when he hit Louis’ favorite person right across the face.

“Harry also gets five penalty slaps, to be doled out whenever he thinks fit.”

Zayn and Liam both “ooh,” and Niall groans.

“That’s not _fair_ ,” he says.

“It wasn’t fair that you slapped Harry without the permission of the slap bet commissioner!” Louis exclaims.

“I thought I won, though,” Niall whines, and turns to look at Harry, try to get some mercy out of him, but Harry just immediately slaps him across the face. Niall goes down _hard_ , a lot harder than Harry did.

“That’s the first one,” Harry says gleefully, shaking his hand out. At least, that’s what Niall thinks he’s doing; he can’t see much where he’s curled up on the floor, moaning. His cheek feels like it’s on _fire_.

“You okay?” Liam asks, kneeling down to Niall’s level, but before he can be even a little comforting, he points at Niall’s face. “Hey, Harry, I can see the outline of your hand!”

Harry gives his big laugh, and Louis somehow laughs even _louder_ , and Niall mutters, “I hate all of you so fucking much,” and that’s when he hears Zayn muse, “You know, I haven’t done any gay porn, but I did do this weird low-budget student thing in college with this bird that, now that I think about it, was basically just soft-core porn.”

This is probably the worst day of Niall’s whole entire existence, he thinks, even as he vows to look up that video on the internet later, too.

 

-

 

 

Harry’s on Louis’ phone, trying to beat this one fucking level of Candy Crush, when an e-mail pops up. He only has two moves left and half the board is jelly, so he wastes his last moves and exits out of the game.

“Babe, you’ve got some mail!” he calls out to Louis, who’s on the fire escape painting something for the last session of the art class he’s taking with Zayn.

“Is it important?” Louis calls back. “I’ve only got about half an hour left of this light.”

“Dunno!”

“Well could you check?” Louis says in this slightly annoyed yet completely _fond_ voice, and Harry grins as he opens up the mail application.

_Dear Mr. Tomlinson,_

_I am delighted to inform you that we have an open spot in our intensive arts program taking place 1 June through 31 August in_ _Paris_ _. If you are still interested, please contact me_ –

But Harry stops reading, slightly confused. The first of June is only two days after their wedding; they’ll still be in America, because there’s no way they’ll spot Bigfoot in only two days and Harry’s not leaving until they spot him or their two weeks are up, whichever comes first. But this e-mail definitely sounds like Louis actually, like, _sought this out_ , which means…is he planning on doing this instead of their honeymoon? Instead of _getting married_ , maybe?

“Well?” Louis eventually yells expectantly. “Do I need to answer it right now?”

“I…I don’t…I don’t know,” Harry says quietly, too quietly for Louis to hear.

“You’re mumbling, can’t hear you!”

And suddenly Harry is _angry_ , so angry. Even if Louis is definitely not going to do this he still reached out and expressed interest in doing something in _Paris_ , _two days into their honeymoon_ , when they’re supposed to be on the _other side of the world_.

“You should probably answer it now. Wouldn’t want to lose your spot in this fancy art program.” He yells, loud enough that Mrs. Hamilton downstairs will probably complain.

Louis sticks his head back through the window, looking very pale. _Good_ , Harry thinks, and doesn’t even feel that badly about it.

“What’d you say?”

“I said, you should probably answer this e-mail if you don’t want to lose your spot. And don’t even think about letting a silly thing like _our wedding_ stop you.”

“Haz – “ Louis starts softly, but Harry holds up one hand to stop him.

“ _Don’t_ even think about it, Lou. How could you do this? How could you apply to this right now?”

“I didn’t – I wasn’t planning on _going_ , obviously, I just wanted – I guess I just wanted to see if I could, you know, if it was still something that I was – that I was good at.”

“But why _now_? Why during our honeymoon? Do you not –“ he inhales sharply, cuts his thought off because of a sudden pain in his chest, his heart breaking or something ridiculous like that.

And then he pushes through anyway.

“D’you not want to get married to me?”

Louis is across the room in a second, arms around Harry, and Harry can’t help but bury his face in Louis’ neck. “Am I not good enough?” he asks, hating the way his voice sounds so small.

“No, _no_ , that’s ridiculous, don’t even _think_ that,” Louis says, one hand in Harry’s curls, his breath warm on Harry’s cheek.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to think then, you’re –“ another sharp inhale, another twist of his heart – “you’re _leaving_ me.”

“I’m not leaving you, Hazza, I couldn’t, I don’t –“ Louis stops talking, choking back a sob. Harry tightens his arms around Louis’ waist, surreptitiously tries to wipe his own eyes on Louis’ shoulder.

“Then what are you _doing_?” Harry asks, practically whispers.

“I’m. I’m trying new things? Like I should have done after university, I guess. Trying to make something out of myself, maybe.”

Harry pulls away to look Louis in the face. “ _Now_? Right now, Louis? We’re getting married in less than a _month_ , we’ve got family and food and – our honeymoon, we’re going to America, we have so many – we have so many _plans_.”

Louis avoids looking at Harry, looks at the floor instead when he chokes out, “I – I _can’t_. It’s too much, I don’t think I can do it, I don’t.” He takes a deep breath, looks up at Harry. “I can’t do it. I can’t get married to you.”

Harry inhales sharply, drops his hands from around Louis, takes a step back. “ _Lou_ ,” he says quietly, roughly.

“Just for now, I think?” Louis asks rather than says, hands reaching out for Harry but dropping quickly. A tear falls down his cheek, and Harry balls his hands into fists to keep from reaching out and wiping it away, making everything better. Harry doesn’t think he can make this better actually, much as he wants to.

“I don’t know if it’s a ‘just for now’ thing,” Harry says, and he thinks he might actually hear the cracking sound of his heart breaking in two. “I think – I think if you leave me you just…leave me.” He shrugs, locking eyes with Louis’, ignoring the tears falling down his own face. “And you _are_ leaving me?”

Louis’ eyes are sad, his whole face is sad, and it matches with Harry and how his entire body suddenly feels wracked with grief when Louis nods, slowly.

”I think – I think I have to.”

Louis moves out the next day. He spends the time leading up to his departure to Paris crashing with Zayn and taking apart every last little piece of his and Harry’s would-be-wedding. Liam comes home from hanging out at the pub with Zayn and Niall with little stories about what else Louis is apparently doing, but he has to tell them to Harry’s closed bedroom door, because Harry crawls into bed and doesn’t move for days.

It’s a pretty shitty time for everyone involved. 

Louis has been out of the country for three days and out of Harry’s life for fifteen when there’s a pounding on the front door of the flat at half twelve in the afternoon that just. Won’t. Stop.

“Li?” Harry calls desperately from where he’s wrapped up in bed, his default position for the last two weeks.

There’s no answer but the pounding of the door – Liam is definitely still at work then.

“Liam?” he calls again anyway.

“No, now get your dumb _arse_ out of bed, Harry Styles!” yells a very familiar female voice through the door. Mrs. Hamilton downstairs is definitely going to lodge a noise complaint.

Harry groans and drags himself out of bed, still wrapped in his duvet as he shuffles to the door and lets his tornado of a sister in.

“What do you want?” Harry mutters, but Gemma ignores him as she breezes past him.

“Right. This is pathetic, kid. When was the last time you showered?”

Harry shrugs. “What’s the point?”

“The _point_ , stupid, is that it’s unsanitary and frankly, pretty gross.”

“Louis _left_ me, Gem,” Harry says quietly, looking up for the first time since she showed up. “ _Lou_.”

Gemma’s entire demeanor changes. “I know, hon,” she says softly. She wraps an arm around his waist and starts leading him toward the couch. He takes the opportunity to lean most of his weight on her; she doesn’t say a word about it, and he’s filled with love for her. At least _she_ hasn’t left him.

“Okay,” she says as she eases them both down until they’re sitting on the couch. “I’m gonna give you one more day of wallowing before I make you put on real clothes, only this time you get to wallow with me, okay?”

Harry nods miserably and then wraps himself around Gemma in a hug. “Thank you,” he whispers.

“Anytime,” she whispers back, kissing his cheek before pulling back and wrinkling her nose. “First, though, you need a shower. It’ll make you feel at least a little more human,” she adds, before he can protest. He nods again and stumbles towards the bathroom, dropping his duvet in the hallway as he goes.

“You better at least be wearing pants when you come back out here!” she yells from the living room, and Harry feels himself start to smile for the first time in two weeks.

Gemma stays overnight, curling up with Harry in bed like they haven’t done in years, since Harry was still young enough to be scared of thunder and crawl into bed with her. She doesn’t say a word when Harry quietly cries himself to sleep, just softly combs her fingers through his hair just like she used to do.

She leaves the next day, with a long hug at the door – Harry wearing trousers and a clean t-shirt to see her off – and she says, “Listen to Taylor Swift. I promise, she’ll make you feel better.”

Harry frowns. “I don’t like Taylor Swift.”

“No, _Louis_ doesn’t like her. I’m telling you. She’ll work wonders for you.”

Harry’s dubious, but Gemma did go through the trouble of loading everything onto his computer, so he might as well. Right after the door shuts, Harry goes back to his room, puts all the Taylor Swift on random, presses play, and lays down on his bed with his eyes closed. He might drift off, he’s not sure – all he knows is that suddenly Taylor is singing _you flashback to when he said forever and always_ and Harry’s eyes pop open.

It sounds like – it reminds him of Louis, of the two of them curled around each other in bed after Louis moved in, when Harry was so full of love and joy and apparently completely blinded to reality. _Here’s to silence that cuts me to the core_ , she sings later, and then _back up, baby, back up, did you forget everything?_ Harry sits straight up, mind full of Louis like it has been for weeks but this time he’s not numb, he’s finally starting to feel something.

 _You didn’t mean it baby, you said forever and always_ , is how Taylor ends the song, and Harry immediately reaches over and listens to it again. And again.

Before he really knows what’s happened, he’s listened to every Taylor Swift song in his library and finds himself singing along to All Too Well at the top of his lungs, steadfastly ignoring Mrs. Hamilton downstairs pounding on her ceiling. Taylor just gets it, Harry thinks. She _understands_. He loves Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift is a genius.

He says as much when Gemma calls to check up on him a week later; she laughs and says, “Told you so. Have you been outside yet?”

Harry makes a face. “I went to the pub last night with the lads?” It wasn’t a great experience, honestly; Demi the Waitress hadn’t been able to stop sending him little pitying looks all night and Cher had staunchly refused to let him pay (and also threatened bodily harm to Niall if he didn’t) and had even laid a hand on his arm and given him sad eyes, which was just so unlike her that he just _knew_ it was about Louis, and he’d come home to his big empty bed and listened to Last Kiss on repeat while staring at the ceiling. But still. He put on proper clothes and left his flat.

Gemma sighs. “I guess that’s better than nothing, but you’ve really got to start getting yourself out there again, Haz.”

“I just got out of a _ten year_ relationship. I thought we were gonna get _married_.” His voice trembles when he says it and there’s that same sharp stab in his chest, but at least he seems to be able to breathe. That’s gotta be progress.

“Look, I’m not saying you need to date anyone right now, but I think you should probably hang out with someone who’s not gonna remind you so much of Louis, yeah? Who’s that friend you’re always talking about from school?”

“Who, Ed? Yeah, I could hang out with Ed more. Did I tell you the joke he told me last time we saw each other?”

"You told me something Ed said, yes, but I'm not sure it counted as a joke," Gemma says dryly. Harry frowns.

"Hey," he protests, drawing the word out, but Gem's already moved on. Or, back to the original topic at hand.

"Ring Ed, see if you can get coffee or something. Stay away from the pub for a while, yeah?"

Harry exhales and nods, even though he knows she can't see him. "Yeah, that's probably a good idea."

And it is. He and Ed even set up a regular coffee date at a little café near school that Harry’s passed a million times and has always sort of thought about going into but never has. Ed claps him on the back when he says this, says, “Good! Expanding your horizons never hurt anyone!”

Harry doesn’t think Ed’s ever been in contact with Gemma, but when he says stuff like that he’s not entirely sure. Still, Harry starts spending time outside of his room, outside of his flat. There are a few days when he only waves at Liam coming home from work before he heads out to meet up with Ed, to have dinner and check out open mic nights featuring people Ed knows. Ed turns out to know a _lot_ of people, people Harry really enjoys getting to know.

Harry spends enough time with Ed and only with Ed that he starts worrying that maybe he’s relying on him a little _too_ much. He hasn’t seen Niall or Zayn for ages, only sees Liam when they’re crossing paths at night or eating breakfast in the morning. He _misses_ them, misses the friends he’s had for years, but also – also he feels a little bit like spending time with them at the pub would be like slipping back into bad habits.

It’s just – the pub reminds him of Louis.

Of course it does, _everything_ reminds him of Louis, but being at the pub reminds him of all the _time_ they spent there. How Louis convinced Liam and Harry to rent their flat because the pub was in the same building. How every Halloween Harry and Louis would dress up and compete in the costume contest. How one year, the year they dressed up as a pirate and his parrot, they _won_. Harry still thinks about that night a lot - Louis sat on the bathroom counter and putting on Harry’s eyeliner slowly, legs wrapped around Harry's waist. Louis leaving a pile of feathers everywhere he went that night, which meant Harry kept finding feathers in his hair and his bed and all around the flat for _weeks_.

So Harry avoids the pub for a while, and instead invites the lads out for a coffee at the café.

It's nice, the four of them hanging out again, a bit like old times, and Harry feels himself relaxing enough that when the cute, gangly barista tells Harry the weekly special - "Pumpkin spice latte," he says, then adds conspiratorially, "It isn't selling well, really, no one's exactly a fan of pumpkin in the middle of July" - Harry feels comfortable enough to joke back, "Yeah, it is a little suspicious. You know, how they manage to fit a whole pumpkin into those little cups."

The barista throws back his head and laughs, and Harry grins. He's feeling like hot stuff when he makes it back over to the boys, and Liam smiles at him encouragingly.

"It's nice to see you flirting again," Liam says, and just like that Harry's good mood is shot. He frowns.

"I wasn't, though. I just managed to make him laugh."

Zayn raises one eyebrow, and Niall says, "Alright, I'll be the judge. What was this joke?"

Harry tells them, and to his surprise, no one laughs. Well, they've always had terrible senses of humor. No one ever laughs at his knock-knock jokes. When he found that horse mask and said he couldn't talk, he was a little hoarse, only Louis laughed. That was a funny joke; Harry's even laughing now, thinking about it.

"Pumpkin spice latte!" the barista calls, and Harry looks up.

"Oh, that's mine," he says, standing.

"Don't forget to ask him for his number," Liam says, and Harry rolls his eyes. When the barista hands him his cup, however, it doesn't say _Harry_ , it says…it says _Nick_ and _call me_ under a phone number. Harry frowns.

"Er. This isn't my name," he says, holding it out for the barista to read. He's expecting the other man to take it, embarrassed, but instead he just winks.

"I know," the barista - _Nick_ , apparently - says.

"Oh. Right. Well. Cheers." Harry raises the cup towards Nick, and then takes a sip as he turns around, to head back to his friends. "Mmm. It's good!" he says, quickly turning back around to smile at Nick, who grins.

"There's a whole pumpkin in there, it'd better be bloody fantastic."

So Harry puts Nick's number into his phone.

He spends a couple days scrolling past it, hovering over it for a few moments, and texting Ed or Niall or Gemma instead. One day he just texts his mum, who sends him back a _:p_ and calls him right away. They talk for almost an hour and he mentions Nick. His mum doesn't push him in either direction. She doesn't say, "It's time to get over Louis, you should call him," or "It's much too soon, what are you even thinking?"

Instead, she just says, "Is he nice?"

"He laughed at a joke I made," Harry says after a few seconds' thought.

"That's nice," Anne muses, and then changes the subject.

After they hang up, Harry calls Nick, who sounds pleased to hear from him. They arrange to go for dinner the next weekend. Harry doesn't tell any of the boys, but they all find out anyway, of course. They're all supportive, especially Liam, who says, " _Good_ for you, mate. This is exactly what you need to help you forget all about Louis."

Which. It's a nice sentiment, Harry guesses, but it's also kind of the opposite of what he wants. Liam's been talking like that a lot, lately, just sly little digs at Louis that don't really _mean_ anything, are basically just designed to help Harry get over him, really, but it still feels uncalled for, maybe.

Then again, Louis' been out of the country for eight weeks. He's supposed to be gone for four more. He hasn't spoken to Harry since he moved out.

It's probably time to stop thinking about him quite so much.

Harry picks Nick up at his flat, and since they're in his neighborhood, he picks the restaurant, a little hole-in-the-wall Greek place with, according to Nick, the absolute _best_ gyros in the city. it's only when they're on their way, walking side by side down the street, that Harry realizes that Nick is actually taller than him.

"Hey," Harry says, and Nick looks over and smiles at him. "You're taller than me."

"Even with your hair," Nick says, and Harry pats the very top of his hair down, where it's puffed up a little, and then points at Nick's quiff.

"You're one to talk. Maybe you're not taller than me."

"Oh, I am," Nick says, and he grins and walks on his tiptoes for a few steps, making Harry laugh.

The whole night is like that, nice and easy. Nick is loud and boisterous, kind of like Louis, which makes Harry's chest ache when he realizes it, that constant ache that's been there for two months sharpening, for just a moment. But then he's not like Louis in all the wrong ways, too, his hand just a little too big over Harry's on the table, his tone just a little too derisive when Harry mentions his aborted trip to search for Bigfoot.

Nick invites Harry back to his for coffee, but Harry is suddenly _morose_ , out on a date with someone besides Louis. He met Louis at eighteen and never dated anyone at school, so this is the first time he's ever had this experience and it's just _not for him_ , he's decided. If he can't date Louis he doesn't want to date anyone. He'll get a cat or something, live with Liam forever and be one of those weird old bachelors everyone will avoid. Something, anything, to avoid having this experience again.

"I don't think it's gonna work out," Harry says, and Nick's hopeful face falls.

"Oh," he says. "Still not over your ex?"

It's the first time anyone has referred to Louis as such and it jolts Harry, how true it really is. Louis is his _ex_ , as in no longer together, and Harry is definitely not over him. He shrugs and nods.

"Yeah, exactly."

"Ah. Well." Nick leans forward and kisses Harry on the cheek. "Maybe in a few months?"

"Maybe," Harry allows, but he knows it won't happen. He waves and heads off, straight back home to meet the boys. He's pretty sure he's never going to see Nick again.

But when he gets into the pub, Harry _does_ see Louis.

 

-

 

 

Louis shows up to the pub a full month early, looking tired and sad but still smiling wide, babbling about how great Paris was and how the teacher loved his work so much she sent him home early, claiming she couldn't teach him anything else. Liam's happy for his friend, he really is - but every time Louis mentions Paris Liam gets a strong desire to punch him in the shoulder, _really_ hard, and he's not sure why.

"The only thing that sucks is that now I'm back without a job or a place to live for a month," Louis says, and he looks sideways at Liam quickly.

 _Serves you right_ , Liam almost says, but then Louis looks at Zayn and asks, "Can I kip at yours for a couple weeks? Just until I can find my own place."

Zayn nods, and Liam exhales. Louis is one of his best friends, yes, but Harry actually _is_ his best friend. He loves Louis, but if there have to be sides in this breakup, Liam is on Harry’s.

Speaking of -

“ _Lou_ ,” Harry says, low and quiet, suddenly standing next to their table. He’s still dressed for his date, nice trousers and a blazer on, and he looks cautiously optimistic, like maybe Louis is there to get back together, and Liam’s heart breaks for him.

“Harry!” Liam exclaims before he can think better. “How was your date?”

Louis’ head whips to gape at Liam, before turning quickly to catch the flush on Harry’s cheeks as he pulls up a chair and sits down at the edge of the table.

“Good, I guess,” Harry says.

“Going to see him again?” Louis asks, and it’s sharp and mean, and a cloud passes over Harry’s face.

“Probably,” he says, almost defiantly. Louis smiles, but it doesn’t reach anywhere near his eyes.

“Great,” he says. “That’s great. I’m glad for you, Haz.” And he reaches out and lays a hand on Harry’s. Harry blinks, slowly, looking at their hands, and then turns to the other side of the table, asking Niall about his day and completely ignoring Louis. Louis looks at the side of Harry’s face for just a minute, and then slowly slides his hand back into his own lap. He looks so sad, so _devastated_ , that Liam can’t help but slide his fingers into Louis’. Louis looks up at him and gives him a tight smile, squeezes his hand.

“I might have a position for you at work,” he says quietly. He notices Harry’s eyes flick over to them, but then he gives all his attention back to Niall, who’s currently explaining the prank war he’s participating in at work, and it’s like he never looked at Louis at all.

“Really?” Louis asks, hopeful, and Liam nods.

“Yeah, the receptionist is out on leave for a couple of weeks. Reckon you can handle answering the phone for a while?”

Louis rolls his eyes. “I think I can do that,” he says, all cocksure bluster, but then he gets quiet and sincere. “Thanks, Li.”

Liam smiles. “Of course, Lou,” and it’s exactly what he said when Louis moved in, before he completely gave up on everyone and everything and left for two months without talking to anyone and Liam is _angry_ again.

He still talks to Simon the next day, though - he’s angry, he’s not mean - and he gets Louis all set up. He even offers to pick up Louis from Zayn’s for his first day. When Liam’s getting ready to leave that morning, bustling around the flat and getting his things together, Harry walks out of his room, bleary-eyed and a bit confused.

“’S early, isn’t it? Why’re you -“ and then he stops. “Oh,” he says quietly. “Lou’s first day, right?”

“Yeah,” Liam says, pausing in his mad morning dash to just look at Harry. “Should I not have -“ He shakes his head, tries again. “This is okay, right?”

“Of course it is, Liam. You’re just helping out a friend with a job.” Harry shrugs. “Just because he’s my -“ Harry swallows and takes a deep breath. Liam’s half-prepared to forget everything and stay home with Harry and wallow. Sure, Harry spent the better half of a month wallowing but now Louis’ back, talking about what a great time he had, so Harry could probably use another good long wallow.

“Just because he’s my _ex_ ,” Harry continues, almost like he never paused in the first place, “doesn’t mean you shouldn’t help him out. He’s one of your best friends. He’s one of _my_ best friends.” 

“Still?” Liam asks before he can stop himself. Harry nods.

“Yeah, he’s still - he’s still _important_ to me. So, you know, you can definitely help him out. It’s not a big deal, really.”

“Right. Okay.” Liam finishes getting everything together, and Harry just kind of stands there next to the kitchen table, hands in the pockets of his robe, staring at the floor, and so before Liam leaves he stops and wraps Harry in a hug. “Love you, Haz.”

Harry nods into Liam’s shoulder and mumbles, “Love you too.”

Liam feels guilty as he leaves, guilty as he makes his way to Zayn’s flat, but when Louis opens the door he looks nervous and excited and Liam thinks maybe this is a good thing. Louis fits in at the office, too, laughing and joking with everyone, and he also manages to answer the phone completely professionally within a few minutes of getting there - Liam hadn’t even realized Louis knew the name of the company, but he answers with a pleasant, “Cowell and Associates, how can I help you?”

In fact, Liam would probably say everything’s going perfectly - right up until the moment Simon leaves Louis’ desk after introducing himself and Louis says, “He’s a right dick, isn’t he?”

“Louis!” Liam hisses. Simon is only a few desks away. Luckily he’s stopped to talk to someone about their shoddy work on his latest model. It’s his favorite thing to do, so he tends to block everyone else out when he does that.

Louis frowns. “Well, he _is_. Barely looked at me and completely ignored your suggestions! You should talk to somebody about him.”

“Who am I going to talk to? He owns the company!”

“Talk to _him_ , then! Tell him you’re a good person with great ideas and he needs to listen to you.”

Liam sputters for a minute. “I can’t just do that. I need this job, you know.”

“You need to be heard and appreciated, too. Right then, I’ll go.” And he stands up.

“No!” Liam yells, holding out both hands in front of him, palms up. Louis huffs and gives Liam an annoyed look.

“Something’s got to be done, Liam. Look, he just made that poor girl cry!” Louis points at Marjorie, who’s tearfully ripping up her latest blueprints. Marjorie’s actually not a great architect, but Liam’s heart still goes out to her.

“Well…just, don’t get me sacked, yeah?”

Louis absolutely _beams_. “Do I have your permission to do whatever it takes?”

Liam sighs. “ _Don’t_ get me _sacked_ , okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, of course,” Louis says, waving a hand. Liam feels a sense of dread creep over him, but it’s too late to do anything now. He heads back to his desk and gets back to work, and even though he looks up at Louis every now and then, he never sees Louis actually _do_ anything, so he forgets about it, mostly.

Louis seems to forget about it too. At least, he doesn’t talk about it anymore, but he does talk about Paris, repeatedly and at length. Anytime Liam comes across Louis in the break room, or someone walks past Louis’ desk, or, one night that week, at the pub every time Harry’s not at the table, Louis is always talking about Paris. It’s starting to drive Liam mad, especially because his desire to punch Louis in the shoulder when he does it is not lessening at all, and so finally one morning he picks Louis up and takes him to the café where Harry met that nice barista he went on a date with (around Louis, they’re still dating, but Harry already told Liam that it just didn’t work out. “Couldn’t see myself doing much more than getting coffee with him,” he said, and then, quieter: “Can’t see myself doing more than that with anyone that’s not Lou, really,” and Liam got sad for Harry and angry at Louis all over again).

“What are we doing here?” Louis asks, and Liam shrugs as nonchalantly as he can.

“Thought I’d buy you a cuppa to celebrate you having the job for over a week now.”

Louis smiles. “You’re so nice, Li, you know that? But since you got me the job, I’ll buy one for you, yeah? What do you want?”

Liam gives him his order, and then says, “Make sure to tell Nick I said hello.”

“‘Course,” Louis says, but he frowns. “Who’s Nick, again?”

“Oh, he’s that tall one with the quiff behind the register, the guy that Haz has been seeing. I’ll wait for you over by the door, yeah?” And he walks off, not missing the pale look on Louis’ face.

Louis gets their tea in record time and practically herds Liam out the door; Liam makes sure to aim a wave at Nick behind the counter, who just kind of looks at him, confused.

“Was that _really_ necessary?” Louis spits once they’re out on the street, walking to the tube.

“Was _what_ necessary?”

“Did you have to humiliate me like that, showing off Harry’s new boyfriend? Isn’t it enough that I’m miserable? Do you really have to tell me that the man I thought I’d marry is happier with someone else?” His voice breaks on the word _marry_ , and Liam looks over at him in surprise to see tears in his eyes.

“I thought Paris was the best time of your life. Is it really so bad being back?”

Louis stops walking in the middle of the street, looks directly at Liam. “Paris was completely miserable. I’m a shit artist, I’ve always known that, but this time they really _confirmed_ it. They didn’t send me home because I was too good, I left because they kept giving me these snide comments about how I wasn’t getting any better and I wasn’t even any good to begin with. I was staying in a shitty hostel with no friends and it was just - it was really bad, Li. And then I get back to London and I’m technically homeless because I screwed everything up with the most important person in my life, and I can’t even be angry about it because it’s all my fault. I want him to be happy, that’s all I’ve ever wanted, but I just don’t understand why he can’t be happy with _me_.”

Liam almost cracks right then, almost breaks open and spills out every secret Harry’s told him since Louis left, every moment Harry says would have been better off with Louis, but he doesn’t. He holds firm. It’s not his to tell, anyway; if Harry wants Louis to know how much worse off he is without him, Harry will tell him.

Instead, Liam wraps an arm around Louis’ shoulders and squeezes. Louis leans his head on Liam’s shoulder and sighs. “It’s hard, Li,” he says softly.

“I know,” Liam says. “But hey - let’s not think about that right now. Let’s go to work!”

“Yay,” Louis says, completely deadpan, but just before they head into the office he catches Liam’s hand and says, sincerely, “Thank you. For everything.”

Liam smiles and squeezes his hand and it feels like a turning point.

Of course, two days later Simon is in a frenzy because his pristine white v-neck shirts, just back from the dry cleaners, are suddenly missing. Louis, as the receptionist and basically the conduit between the company and the outside world, should know exactly where they were dropped off, but he keeps telling Simon that the shirts were dropped off in his office while he was at lunch and that’s the last Louis knew of them. Simon stomps off, slamming the door to his office when he goes, and when Louis moves his desk chair a little closer to his desk, Liam can hear a crinkle of plastic.

“Lou,” he says slowly, warningly, and Louis just looks up at him, grinning. “That’s what I think it is, right?”

“I’m going to write him a letter from his shirts,” Louis says, pulling up a new document on his computer, “saying that they’ll return once he’s stopped being such a massive prick.”

Liam groans. “Are you kidding me?”

“Absolutely not, Liam. This is the only way to get through to him, trust me. I call it Tomlinson Justice.”

“Louis, please, please, will you just give Simon his shirts back?”

“He’ll never learn anything like that. He’s got to understand his actions have consequences.” Louis finally glances up from his computer at Liam. “I promise, I’ve had a lot of practice dealing with people who think they should always get their way. This works.”

“Dealing with _people_ or dealing with _children_? Because this sounds like something you should do for five-year-olds.”

“Children are people too,” Louis says. “Now be quiet, I’m writing a ransom note.”

Liam stands at Louis’ desk for a moment, just to see if he realizes how absolutely ridiculous he’s being.

He never does, obviously. The next day Simon comes in to a typed ransom note from his shirts on his desk that he reads out loud to everyone in a completely disparaging tone, before finishing up with, “If I don’t get my shirts back by eleven, I’ll start sacking people. How’s that for unreasonable?”

Liam kicks Louis under the desk and mutters, “Give them back.” Louis just shakes his head.

“It’s Tomlinson Justice, Liam, it never fails.”

Simon comes out every twenty minutes to announce the time and threaten everyone’s jobs; at twenty to eleven, he threatens to sack everyone in the entire company and start over from the ground up. “I’ll call it a rebuilding year. I’m an architect, I’m good at building.”

“Now, Louis?” Liam asks, starting to get desperate, but before it’s even out of his mouth Louis has started shaking his head.

“It’s all a big bluff.”

At eleven, though, Simon announces that his shirts are still gone and calls Marjorie into his office; she’s already crying on her way in, and Louis has gone completely pale.

“Tomlinson Justice has always worked before,” he whispers, sounding panicked.

“Just give them _back_ ,” Liam says, but Louis _still_ shakes his head.

“No, no, it’s got to be a bluff, he’s just telling that girl her blueprints are rubbish again or something.”

Liam sighs. “Lou, I really didn’t want to have to do this, but -“ and he grabs the shirts from under Louis’ desk and runs them towards Simon’s office. Louis has always been faster, though; he played football in uni, and it shows as he sweeps a leg under Liam’s to lay Liam flat on his back.

“Absolutely not,” he says, grabbing the shirts back.

“Okay, you leave me no choice,” Liam groans from his spot still on the floor. “I’m gonna have to let you go.”

Louis snorts. “You can’t do that. Can you?” He looks at Liam nervously. Liam nods.

“I got you the job, I can get rid of you, too. You’re one of my best mates, but Marjorie deserves her job more than you. Sorry,” he adds when Louis looks kind of crestfallen.

“No, you’re right,” Louis says, reaching down and helping Liam up, before handing him the shirts. “I don’t think my brand of justice really suits the office environment, anyway.”

“You belong in a primary school,” Liam says. “It’s a good place for you, I think.”

“Yeah,” Louis says, smiling at him. “You’re right. Now, go save Marjorie’s job!”

Liam does, and he only has to endure Simon making snide little comments about him bringing a shirt-napper into work for a few minutes.

Louis waits for him after work, walking him back to the pub, and he starts talking about how excited he is about getting back to work at school, how he missed it while he was away, and Liam finally can’t take it anymore; he rears back and slugs Louis, hard, in the shoulder.

“What the _fuck_?” Louis exclaims, holding on to his arm. “I think I’ve lost all feeling in this arm, Li, what was that about?”

And Liam knows why he’s so angry, figured it out the second his fist made contact. “You _left_ ,” he says, as angrily as he ever says anything, “and you didn’t even _tell_ anyone you were thinking about it. I know you had a shitty time without any friends but you know what? We were all right here, Louis. Right where you left us.”

“I didn’t think -“ Louis starts to say, but Liam’s not done.

“Right, you didn’t think. You didn’t just leave Haz, you left _me_ , too. We’ve been friends for ten years and you just…left.”

“I’m sorry,” he says softly, staring at the ground, and then clears his throat and looks Liam in the eye. “I’m _so_ sorry. I was a right knob and I’ve learned my lesson, I think. I won’t do it again, I promise.”

“You better not,” Liam says, but he’s lost his steam. He pulls Louis into a hug. “Okay. I’m done being angry.”

“Good,” Louis says, muffled, into his shoulder. He squeezes tight once and then releases Liam. “Now. Will you help me figure out what to say as the reason I got sacked?”

“I dunno,” Liam says thoughtfully. “I’m pretty sure ‘writing ransom letters from shirts’ is a pretty good reason.”

Louis laughs, and Liam feels something that was tight in his chest slowly unravel.

 

-

 

Louis spends too much time in the fucking _Good Karma Café_ , sitting in a chair in the corner nursing a cup of tea and trying his best not to glare at the tall gangly fuck serving coffee all cheerfully. He keeps making dumb jokes, too, jokes that Harry probably _loves_. God, but does Louis hate him, so much.

He’s been back from Paris for a good six weeks now, and if he’s being truthful with himself, he figured he and Harry would be back together already. He knows he screwed up when he left and didn’t call, but he didn’t think Harry or anyone would _want_ to hear from him, and he didn’t think his silence would have this many repercussions when he got back. He didn’t think Harry and Liam would still be barely talking to him over a month later, especially after he broke down and told Liam how utterly _horrible_ the experience had ended up being. He had half expected Liam to go straight off to Harry with that news, and had spent the entire night after that waiting for Harry to knock on Zayn’s door and invite him back home.

But instead of being back in his flat with his fiancé he’s sleeping on a couch and stalking some hipster barista. This is his life, these are his choices.

And the barista is _definitely_ a hipster, too; when Louis followed him home last week he stopped at a record shop and then bought a fucking baguette from an organic market. Carried it home in a reusable bag with the top of it sticking out, a stack of “new” vintage records under his other arm.

Christ, Louis hates him.

He’s practically seeing red as he sees the barista - _Nick, the guy Haz has been seeing_ , he hears Liam saying in his head for the millionth time, and he might just feel his blood start to boil with the idea that _this guy_ gets to date Harry instead of Louis - wrap a scarf around his neck and get ready to leave. Louis starts gathering up his stuff and drinks the last of his tea to get ready to see where Nick’s going next, perversely interested in what he does when he’s not with Harry.

Which, so far, seems to be all of the time. Louis’ been gathering information on Nick for almost two weeks now, in his spare time from work, and Louis hasn’t seen Harry at all, at least not with Nick. Harry’s been at the pub most nights, and he and Louis have slowly been coming back to themselves, sharing small smiles and laughing together every once in a while. They still don’t sit on the same side of the booth, and the other day when Harry forgot himself for a minute and squeezed Louis’ arm on the way out after last call, they’d both frozen - Louis in anticipation - and then Harry had dropped his hand and said “G’night, Lou,” slow and soft, and walked off without a second glance.

So Louis has seen Harry, but from what he can tell, Nick hasn’t. When he’s in a good mood, that means that Harry isn’t seeing Nick anymore, but when he’s in a dark mood - which, unfortunately, seems to be a lot more frequent these days, every time he comes home from work to remember that he’s living on a couch, away from his absolute best friend of ten years - that means that Harry is already in Nick’s place when Nick gets home, and they’re listening to Nick’s hipster records and cooking with organic ingredients and trading dumb jokes and it always, always makes Louis’ chest _ache_.

He’s never thought about a life without Harry, not since the moment they met, and suddenly facing a future without him is the scariest thing he’s ever done. He _knows_ it’s his fault, he knows that, and it’s not like he wants to break up Harry and Nick even - though he does, a little bit - if Harry’s happy with him. Louis has spent ten years wanting Harry to be happy, going out of his way to make him happy, and then Louis was stupid enough to think that maybe he needed something more than Harry to make _himself_ happy, and it’s the worst decision he’s ever made.

The second worst decision is probably this one right here, where he’s walking down the street after Harry’s new boyfriend. No, he’s not just walking down the street, he’s _stalking_ Harry’s new boyfriend, and it’s incredibly dumb and -

Louis goes down. He’s too busy looking at Nick to realize that he’s walked directly into a trash bin. He goes sprawling, and most everyone around him stops to look at him, including - fuck shit god _dammit_ \- bloody hipster barista Nick.

Louis scrambles up, dusting himself off and brushing off the very nice old lady trying to help, eyes trained on Nick the entire time, so he sees the exact moment that Nick recognizes him, eyes lighting up in recognition and then confusion. Louis doesn’t even pretend to walk, he _sprints_ away, silently thanking every single coach who ever made him run laps. He doesn’t turn around to see if Nick is following, he just books it down the street, not even slowing down until he’s six blocks away. He stops, for just a moment, bouncing from foot to foot and checking behind him to see if anyone’s noticed, and then jogs the rest of the way back to Zayn’s place.

He spends the night tossing and turning, convinced he’s going to get a text or a call or, god forbid, a visit from Harry, who has no doubt heard everything from Nick - Louis has honestly spent twelve straight days at Nick’s place of work, watching him and staying through his shift and asking after him when he wasn’t there, glaring at him when he was.  Nick’s had to have recognized him, had to have realized just who he is, and even if he hasn’t, all he has to do is describe him to Harry, and Harry will know right away.

Louis doesn’t hear anything, though. Zayn tries to ask him about it the next morning.

“You look like shit, mate,” he says over his coffee.

“Thanks,” Louis says with a snort.

“Just tellin’ the truth,” he says, with a shrug. “Something happen? You wanna talk about it?”

Louis thinks about it for a minute, trying to explain everything, but it all seems a bit much, so he just hums and shakes his head.

“Well if you need me, I’m here,” Zayn says.

“Good to know,” Louis says, smiling.

He’s feeling a little better as he goes to work, though he does look around every corner, expecting to see Harry jumping out at him, confused as to what Louis’ even been _thinking_ , probably, and Louis wishes he knew, wishes he had an answer.

He doesn’t even _think_ about stopping by the café for his morning tea, which means he’ll have to settle for shitty teachers’ lounge tea or even _coffee_ , and he’ll probably be dragging all day. It might be a little counter-intuitive - he should probably be on high alert, just in case - but he absolutely knows he could not handle any reaction he could possibly get from the hipster barista today, be it pity or laughter or contempt or _anything_.

He thinks about just popping in a film and sleeping through the whole day, but of course his kids are screaming around the room as soon as he gets there, so he sticks to his lesson plan and tries to wear them out with reading and activities and, at the end of the day, fingerpainting. As he’s talking to the kids about art, finding something to praise in every student’s work, he starts breathing a little bit easier. This is what he was always meant to do, he thinks as he looks around at the pure joy on the kids’ faces. For just a little while he forgets about his worry that Harry’s going to show up, he forgets about how much he wishes life were like _before_ , before he left, before he stopped talking to his friends, before he came back and expected everything to be the same.

Instead, he watches these kids learn something new and take joy and pride in it, and as he ruffles Jamie’s hair (he knows that as a teacher he’s not supposed to have favorites, but if he had to pick one, it would be Jamie) he suddenly knows exactly what he has to do to get out of this rut, this hole he’s gotten himself into.

He talks to Zayn when he gets home, asks if Zayn even thinks it’s a good idea. Zayn, bless him, smiles and pulls Louis into a hug.

“I think it sounds perfect,” he says, and Louis hugs him back, tight.

He spends the next few days looking for recipes online and talking to his mum - whose first reaction when she hears he’s planning on cooking is laughter, which makes him frown hard.

“I’m being serious,” he says, and his mum fucking _giggles_ , and then he hears one of his sisters ask what’s so funny, and when his mum answers, “Louis is going to cook,” all he can hear is even _more_ laughter, so he hangs up.

His mum calls him back twenty minutes later, finally calm, and actually has helpful things to say. Not so helpful is when Daisy grabs the phone and asks if he remembers that time he ruined a pot boiling water, especially since Louis can’t take it and just hangs up again.

After half a week of worrying, he finally decides if he doesn’t at least _try_ to do this, he will actually never get up the nerve, so he pulls Liam aside one night at the pub when Harry’s at the bar, talking to Demi the Waitress, and asks for a favor.

“What do you need, Lou?” Liam asks. He sounds just a little suspicious, which Louis doesn’t blame him for. Things have been a lot better since Liam punched him, but they’re still a bit uneasy around each other; Louis is almost entirely sure it’s because Harry was a wreck while he was gone, and Liam is just being a good friend, trying to make sure Harry doesn’t get hurt again. Louis gets it, he does, he just can’t seem to get Liam to understand that _Louis_ doesn’t want Harry to get hurt again either.

“I was wondering if I could get you and maybe Harry out of your flat for a couple hours Saturday night?”

“Why?”

“I’m gonna - I’m gonna try to get Hazza back.”

Something that looks like joy passes over Liam’s face, but it’s gone so quickly Louis is almost sure he’s imagined it. “And how are you going to do that?” he asks cooly.

“I was thinking about surprising him by cooking the same meal he cooked me when he proposed?”

And that’s it, Liam just _melts_. “Oh, _Louis_ ,” he says, and hugs his neck. “I think that’s a wonderful idea,” he says when he pulls back, and Louis beams. “Although - are you really going to cook?”

Louis sighs. “I am _not_ that bad in the kitchen, I can follow a set of instructions, _honestly_ , you’d think I was an imbecile, the way everyone goes on about it.”

Liam frowns. “You _did_ set off the smoke alarm making toast one morning.”

“Harry distracted me!” Louis exclaims. “Whatever. Can I have the flat, or not?”

“‘Course, of course, yeah. You still have your key?”

Louis pauses, and then shakes his head. He gave it back to Harry the day he left. Liam squeezes his shoulder. “I’ll give you mine that night, okay?”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“Just promise not to burn the place down, yeah?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Louis says, rolling his eyes, but he’s smiling. He spends the next three days completely calm, putting together grocery lists, and then he wakes up Saturday morning in a nervous sweat.

If this doesn’t work - if this doesn’t work, Louis doesn’t know what he’ll do. So it just has to work. It _has_ to.

He buzzes through the whole day, buzzes through buying food and getting together all his supplies, buzzes through Liam dropping his key off and promising that he’d talked to Ed, gotten him to keep Harry out until at least half eight. Louis checks his recipes and does some quick math and then finally just decides he can’t wait any longer, he’ll have to kill time at Liam’s if he has to.

When he walks in, he drops Liam’s keys on the table next to the door and toes off his shoes and then he just stops.

The place hasn’t changed since he left, not one bit. Hope flares in his chest, and for just a second he imagines himself living here again, waking up curled around Harry, having sex just loudly enough for Liam to complain, the three of them sharing tea and cereal around the breakfast table in the morning. He needs this to work so badly.

He starts setting up in the kitchen, putting together things that will take longer to cook and putting up things he won’t need for later, and after he puts the chicken in the oven and the sauce on the stove he sets the breakfast table for two. As he’s pulling out the cloth napkins that Harry likes to use on special occasions, he finds the two tapered candles he last saw on his and Harry’s tenth anniversary, the night Harry proposed. His heart twists, and he grabs them before he thinks better of it . He sets them in the center of the table and lights them, turns off all the other lights in the flat except for the kitchen, and is hit with such a strong memory of the night Harry proposed he has to sit down.

He pulls out one of the chairs at the breakfast table and collapses into it, remembering the complete and utter _joy_ on Harry’s face when he’d kneeled in front of Louis sitting in this same exact chair, a ring box in his hand while he asked Louis to make him the happiest man in the world. Louis hadn’t even said anything, just launched himself into Harry’s arms and kissed all over his face as they both fell to the floor. Harry had laughed and asked, “Is that a yes?”

“Of course, you idiot,” Louis had said softly, probably with the same hearts in his eyes he always got over Harry.

He’s so lost in thought that at first he thinks the smell of smoke is just the candles on the table, but then he realizes that candles don’t usually have quite that much smoke, and then he leaps up and runs back into the kitchen and -

Everything is ruined. The chicken looks like charcoal and the sauce is now a permanent fixture of the pot (he hadn’t even realized he’d turned the stove on, let alone up quite that high) and he has no idea how to fix it, how to fix anything, and he’s panicking so he just pulls out the spaghetti and puts it in a pot and pours water into it and dumps the whole thing on the stove and turns it on and _then_ he looks at the box of pasta for instructions and he’s done it wrong, he’s done everything wrong.

He slides down the cabinets under the sink until he’s sitting on the floor, legs sprawled out in front of him, and calls his mum, putting the phone on speaker and setting it on the edge of the sink.

“I’ve ruined everything,” he says when she answers, and to his horror, he sounds like he’s about to cry.

“What’s happened?” she asks softly.

“I thought Harry would always be there so I got complacent and left him and now he’ll never take me back.”

“Oh,” Jay says. “And he’s told you this?”

“Well, no,” Louis says. “But I’ve gotten Liam to let me into the flat to surprise Harry and I’ve made a mess of everything.”

“It can’t be that bad, love.”

“It’s an absolute _wreck_ ,” he says, and sniffs. He is _not_ going to cry right now, he’s just not. He can feel it coming, though, and he knows he probably won’t be able to stop it. He sniffs again. “I’m never going to get him back like this, Mum,” he says quietly. “He’ll take one look at the destruction I’ve done to his kitchen and laugh me out of town.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Jay says. “Harry loves you. He’ll certainly never ‘laugh you out of town,’ honestly, Lou. Now. Get up, clean up the mess, and start over.”

“I dunno if it’s worth it, honestly. He’s probably on another date with that _fucking_ \- sorry - barista.” Louis hasn’t been by the café in a week, too afraid that Nick would recognize him, and to be honest, he hasn’t thought much about Harry being with Nick either but suddenly - suddenly everything feels like it’s working against him, and it makes all the sense in the world that that’s actually where Harry is tonight, not out with Ed.

“Louis William Tomlinson,” Jay says, sounding firm, and _that_ gets his attention. “Will all this be worth it if you and Harry get together again?”

“Yes,” Louis says. _Absolutely_ , he thinks.

“Then it’s worth it,” she says, and she sounds completely convinced. Louis loves his mum.

There’s a soft noise in the direction of the kitchen door, and he looks up quickly, expecting to see the place on fire or something, but no. Instead, it’s Harry, standing in the doorway, just looking at him. Louis can feel his eyes going wide.

“Mum, I have to go,” he says, and and grabs the phone and hangs it up and drops it on the floor in one motion, never looking away from Harry.

“What’s going on?” Harry asks softly, and he sounds so fond, so normal, so like Louis’ _Harry_ that Louis bursts into tears. Harry is kneeling at his side in a second.

“I’ve ruined everything,” Louis says again, and when Harry rubs one hand between Louis’ shoulder blades he just tips sideways until his head’s on Harry’s chest. “I’ve been a twat and made a giant mess of everything and I don’t blame you if you don’t love me anymore, I _don’t_ ,” he babbles into Harry’s shirt.

Harry puts his hands on Louis’ shoulders and pushes him away from his chest, just until they can lock eyes. “Of course I love you,” he murmurs. “I’ve never stopped, since the day we met.”

“You love me?” Louis asks thickly. “Not that dumb barista with the quiff?”

Harry just shakes his head, a soft smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “Never,” he says, pulling Louis into his chest again. “It’s always been you, Lou,” and Louis can feel the rumbling of Harry’s words in his bones. “Even if he did laugh at my joke.”

“What joke?” Louis asks.

“I got a pumpkin latte and asked, ‘how do they fit the pumpkin in this tiny little cup?’”

Louis snorts. “That’s a terrible joke, Harry.”

Harry just grins and kisses him.

 

-

 

 

“So I have this favor to ask,” Louis asks one night when they’re all at the pub. Almost immediately Harry says, “Of course, babe, anything,” and squeezes his shoulder. Louis smiles, and rests his head on Harry’s shoulder, and Niall just about wants to _throw up_ they are so disgusting. They’ve been back together for three months but it feels like three _years_ , the way they’re making up for lost time or something and touching and being all lovey-dovey. Niall does not _care_ \- he’s been stalled in his prank war at work for months because first Louis, mastermind behind all of Niall’s best pranks, left, and then Harry, his back-up mastermind, was all sad, and since they’ve gotten back together all they’ve done is mumble sweet nothings into each other’s mouths and no one will bother to look over the blueprints for Niall’s next prank and tell him whether or not it’ll work.

“It’s not, like, a big favor,” Louis says, and oh, is he still talking about this?

“What is it, Tommo?” Niall asks, because that seems like the best way to get him to spit it out already.

“Well, while I was unemployed, a bloke from my art class - Robbie, Zayn, you know him - asked if I wanted to be in this play with him, and I said yes, and we’ve been working on it for a while and he says it’s finally ‘ready for human consumption’,” and he grimaces, just a little, and Niall’s pretty sure he can see where this is going and he does _not_ like it, “and I was hoping I could get all of you to come.”

Ding ding ding! Niall was right. He opens his mouth to say _absolutely not_ , but then everyone else is piping up in the affirmative. Zayn even says, “Sounds like fun, mate, Robbie’s cool.”

“What’s the play about?” Liam asks.

“It’s a, uh, conceptual piece? About , like, rage and envy and capitalism. It’s quite - it can be quite powerful,” Louis says, but he looks like he believes absolutely none of this. Right, then, Niall’s definitely not going.

“I’m not going to see that,” Niall says, and Louis kind of shrugs and nods like that’s what he expected from everyone but _Harry_ , man, Harry shoots daggers at Niall with his eyes.

“Yes you are,” he says fiercely.

“It’s okay, Haz,” Louis says. “It’s probably not going to be very good.”

“No, he’s going. We’re _all_ going,” Harry says, looking around at everyone. Liam and Zayn nod; Harry looks back at Niall with a smug look on his face, like, _see?_

“We’ll make a night of it,” Liam says. “Dinner before, and then we can take Louis out for drinks after, yeah?”

Zayn nods, and Louis kind of lights up at that, like he can’t believe it. Harry grins so wide Niall is afraid he might break something.

“ _Fiiiiiine_ ,” Niall says with a sigh. “I’ll go see your art student play about rage.”

“Really, Niall?” Louis asks, and he looks so happy that Niall kind of deflates and resigns himself to it.

“Yeah, yeah, anything for you, Louis,” Niall says, and Harry and Louis both beam at him, which he guesses is kind of nice.

Not so nice is the play, though. It’s in an office building right off the West End, so that they can _technically_ say it’s a West End play. It’s not, though. Niall doesn’t remember the last time he had to hike up twelve flights of stairs for a night at the theatre, though he supposes that could be because he’s not sure he’s ever been to a night at the theatre. The room it’s being held in is packed full of (empty) folding chairs, with a blank circle of space right in the middle, and oh sweet Jesus it’s in the _round_ , there will be absolutely no escaping it.

Niall takes a seat at the very edge, hunkering down and covering his face, but Harry hauls him up by the shoulders and makes him sit with everyone in the front row. It’s not like they won’t be able to _see_ ; there are literally three other people in the audience, scattered throughout the chairs. It’s not a packed house, that’s for sure.

“We gotta make sure Lou can spot us,” Harry says, and Niall snorts but hunkers down, thinks about pulling out his phone. Zayn pulls his out first, and Harry immediately grabs it and puts it in his pocket. “Not at the theatre, Z, come on.”

“Just checking the time,” Zayn says, but Harry refuses to give up the phone anyway. Zayn shrugs, and they all face forward and wait.

After about ten minutes, Louis and two other men, all dressed entirely in black, make their way through the chairs to the middle of the room. Unfortunately, there’s not really an aisle, so there’s a lot of scraping noises as they shove chairs aside and put them back. At one point, one of the men knocks into one of the three people scattered around the room and whispers, “Sorry!” incredibly loudly. Niall laughs. Louis looks embarrassed but Harry actually reaches over Liam to punch Niall in the shoulder until he looks at him, just so Harry can glare at him and hold a finger over his lips.

This is gonna be a long night.

And it is, it really is; Niall can tell the whole thing is mean to be arty, but it’s honestly just not very good. There are a lot of stops and starts - at one point, the house lights are even brought up for fifteen minutes because someone drops something and they need to find it before they can continue the scene. It’s _unbearable_ , and so after the play, when everyone gathers around Louis and Liam and Zayn struggle to figure out something to say even as Harry is gathering Louis into his arms and saying, “That was so good, that was amazing, I can’t even believe how good that was,” Niall just puts his hand on Louis’ shoulder and says, in the sweetest tone of voice he can muster, “Aw, Lou. That sucked.”

He’s prepared for Harry’s glare this time, has even ducked behind Liam to try to avoid it, but he’s not prepared for Louis’ reaction.

“Y’know what, Niall,” Louis says angrily, “we actually put a lot of work into that, and I know it wasn’t great, but couldn’t you be a good friend for a few minutes and just, I dunno, _lie_ for me? Liam and Zayn did!”

“What? No, of course I didn’t!” Liam protests, hands up, even while Zayn’s nodding at Louis. “I really loved the whole audience participation aspect of it.”

Otherwise known as when Louis shoved a mirror into Liam’s face, yelled “This is the face of consumerism!” and Liam stood up and took a bow.

“Yeah, about that,” Louis says. “You weren’t actually supposed to participate, it was supposed to be more of a passive thing.”

“Oh. That would’ve made more sense,” Liam muses.

Niall just shakes his head. “Still would’ve sucked.”

Louis glares at him.

“Sorry, mate, I gotta tell it like it is. I can’t lie just to spare your feelings.”

“Well, you _should_ ,” Louis says. “That’s what a good friend would do. If you had a shitty play I’d sit through the whole thing and tell you how great you were at the end.”

Niall nods. “Right then. Challenge accepted!”

Louis narrows his eyes. “Wasn’t a challenge.”

“Doesn’t matter! Accepted anyway. I’m gonna put on the absolute worst play anyone’s ever seen, and all of you have to come see it.”

“Hey, I didn’t agree to that,” Zayn says, but he’s smiling as he continues, “Can’t wait to see this disaster, though.”

Niall vows to look up some Rhythm Boyz choreography just for him.

“Yeah, it could be fun,” Liam says. Poor, sweet, naive Liam.

“Okay,” Louis says. “Fine. I promise to come to your play, and I promise to tell you it’s great.”

“Excellent,” Niall says, and rubs his hands together gleefully.

“Oh god,” he hears Harry whisper. Niall just cackles.

He spends two weeks observing his friends, trying to figure just what, exactly, would be the worst thing any of them could sit through. He spends a week trying to get in touch with the other Rhythm Boyz, just to torture Zayn a little, but he can only find three, and a reunion without all of them would be unnecessarily shitty, so he scraps that. He does learn the choreography for _Nothin’ Better Than a Girl_ , the single from the music video, and by the time he’s done he feels a certain kinship with Zayn - if he’d had to perform this dance more than once, he’d probably never dance again, either.

Then Niall just spends a few days thinking of anything he can to make his one man show longer, interminable, before he finally puts together shitty costumes - one-upping Louis, even, who didn’t wear anything but black his entire show - and books the same performance space Louis did.

All in all, it’s over a month before Niall pulls up a chair to their booth at the pub and hands out colorful fliers.

“What’s this?” Liam asks, and Louis groans.

“I thought you’d forgotten about this,” he says to Niall.

“Nope! Been workin’ on it all month. Honing my craft.”

Louis rolls his eyes.

“Well, I’m looking forward to it,” Harry says, looking the flier over. “Seems, er, fun, I guess.”

Niall laughs. “I’m sure Tommo’s looking forward to it too.”

“Of course. Anything for you, Ni,” Louis says.

“Good! Saturday, seven o’clock, be there!”

“We will.” Louis is all steely determination, like he’s gonna win this, he’s definitely gonna be able to sit through Niall’s terrible play and come out the other side with something nice to say. Niall has to remember to take a picture of Louis’ face when he tries, he needs a new phone background.

The night of his show, he sets up the room the same way it had been for Louis’, folding chairs all around, blank circle in the middle, but when he comes out, instead of moving the seats out of his way, he just steps on them, bounding towards the blank space and leaping off the final chair until he’s in the middle, almost directly over Louis.

“Welcome!” he says in his best announcer voice. Louis, Harry, Zayn, and Liam are in the front row again, but to Niall’s surprise, there’s actually a few other people scattered around. He wonders how fast they’ll leave.

It ends up being halfway through the first act and his endless recitation of his favorite insults, which is actually pretty great timing because it means he gets to shout, “Ya shower of cunts!” at their retreating backs.

That’s when he pulls out a small water pistol and starts shooting it into the audience, too - which basically just means he squirts all his friends in the face, but Louis the most. He cackles, and then bounces away, yelling, “Play’s not over, I’ve gotta change costumes!” as he goes.

He puts on his homemade robot costume and makes a couple prank calls on speaker, and then makes a real call for takeaway, all in a toneless robotic voice. Next, Niall pulls a small table through the chairs - making sure to knock into Louis as he goes - and sits down for ten minutes, looking through his Spanish book from school and reading out random conversations (“Como estas tu?” “Bien. Y tu?” “Muy bien, gracias!”) until his takeaway arrives.

When it does, he beckons the delivery guy over, through all the chairs, and gives him an extra big tip for the supremely bored look on his face as he does so. Then, Niall settles down and eats for fifteen minutes. Louis finally sighs and stands up halfway through, preparing to leave, but Niall just holds up one hand and says, “Uh-uh, show’s not over yet!” and he sighs again and sits back down.

Niall loves this.

After he’s done eating, he gathers all his garbage together incredibly slowly, and then walks over to the boys and holds out his hand for any of their rubbish. Liam hands him a gum wrapper and says, “That’s nice,” approvingly.

Then Niall pulls out his water pistol again, and that’s when Louis finally stands up and says, “That’s it! I can’t take it anymore!”

“But there’s a whole nother act!” Niall exclaims, finding that he’s actually a little _disappointed_ at the idea that he might not be able to finish.

“No, stop, this is _terrible_ , this is so bad, I can’t do it. Fine! You win!” He throws his arms up, and Niall thrills a little at winning, but still wants to finish the show.

“Are you _sure_ I can’t get you to stay?” he asks. “Next I do that thing where I do a duet by myself, it’s gonna be sick.”

Harry stands up wordlessly, hauls back, and slaps Niall hard across the face. Niall crumples to the ground immediately. That slap was like the last one times a _million_ , somehow. He’s pretty sure he’s whimpering.

“That’s two,” Harry says. Niall hears Louis laugh and he’s pretty sure he high fives Harry, who hisses. “Sorry. Hand’s still tender,” he says, and Niall moans loudly, petting his burning cheek.

 

-

 

"Your hair's getting awfully long, Hazza," Louis says one morning, running a hand through Harry's head while Harry sits at the breakfast table. Harry hums while Louis scratches lightly, and then frowns when Louis continues on his way to the kitchen to make his tea.

"I like it long," Harry says.

"Me too," Louis says, reappearing in the kitchen doorway with a smile on his face and a mug in his hand. "You should come visit the kids today. We just watched Tangled yesterday, I'm sure they'd love to call you 'Rapunzel'."

"I know you're making fun of me, but that actually sounds nice."

"I would never dare make fun of calling you 'Rapunzel', babe," Louis says, walking back over to Harry and tangling a hand in his curls again. Harry sighs contentedly and leans his head against Louis' torso.

"I'll stop by this afternoon," Harry murmurs, and Louis presses a kiss to his forehead.

He shows up during nap time, letting himself into Louis' dark classroom quietly and crouching down next to where Louis is sitting behind his desk, head on his arms as he watches over his students.

“Hey,” he says quietly. Louis smiles slowly at him, looking a bit like he’s in need of a nap himself.

“Hi,” he says back. “Thanks for coming.”

“‘Course,” Harry says, nuzzling against Louis’ shoulder just a little. “I love your kids.”

Louis’ entire face goes soft, the way it always does when they talk about kids, whether it’s his students or their hypothetical future kids, and he leans over to kiss Harry quickly.

“Mmm. What’s the plan?” Harry asks as Louis pulls back. Louis shrugs.

“I was thinking we’d let the kids decide when they got up.”

“Sounds good,” Harry says, and then he curls up next to Louis, head on his leg, and takes a short nap - he’s just come from a test he’s been studying for the past two weeks, and he’s _exhausted_. He wakes up when Louis moves his head carefully to stand up and flick the lights back on, waking all the kids up, who light up when they see Harry. They all love Harry, who shows up a few times a week, usually when they’re going home, to play around with them. He never protests to anyone crawling all over him, using him like a living prop in their games. He’s portrayed everything from a flower to Godzilla, and he never fails to make the kids laugh and scream. He loves it.

Today, one of the girls - Ruby, Harry thinks her name is - asks if she can try to put Harry’s hair in plaits like Rapunzel in Tangled, and Harry looks straight up at Louis as he says, “Of course.” Louis holds his hands up like _don’t look at me_ but his eyes are sparkling with laughter and Harry’s almost entirely sure this is all his idea.

He doesn’t mind, though. It’s actually rather nice, having so many hands in his hair. It’s not quite long enough to actually put in plaits, though that doesn’t stop a few girls from trying. It is long enough to wrap around beads and snap barrettes into, and Harry’s pretty sure a couple kids are just tying knots in his hair, which will probably be a bitch to get out, but he’s planning on making Louis do that, so it’s okay.

He doesn’t even mind when Louis pulls out paintbrushes and acrylic paint and says, “Pretend Harry’s your canvas.” Some of the boys who were looking askance at all the bright pink things going into Harry’s hair jump for the paint brushes, and Harry rolls up the ankles of his jeans as well as he can and holds his arms straight out in front of him so the kids can go to town. The paint is cool at first, and Harry shivers a little, but then it warms up and it’s just pleasant, having soft paintbrushes across his skin.

He makes the mistake of looking up at Louis at one point, and Louis’ eyes are hooded and he’s looking at Harry like he wants to _wreck him_ , and Harry has to bite his lip and avert his gaze, do anything he can to not think about Louis’ hands in his hair, taking the knots out, and smoothing over his skin, taking the paint off.

The kids make a complete mess out of Harry - he lets one of them paint his cheeks, mainly because he doesn’t realize it’s happening until it’s too late - and after they go home, Louis just stands there, smirking at Harry where’s he still sitting on the brightly colored alphabet carpet.

“Good look for you,” he says.

“Thanks,” Harry says, preening. “I’m thinking of inviting them over to make me up before the wedding.”

“Don’t you dare,” Louis says, laughing.

Harry hops up and kisses Louis before rubbing his cheek, still a little bit wet with paint, on Louis’.

“Stop, stop!” Louis squeals, and so Harry rubs one arm and leg on Louis’, trying to mark him, but he’s mostly dried at this point, so all that happens is Louis gets a few smears of paint and Harry’s paint starts flaking off.

“Oh,” he says when he realizes, looking in disappointment down at the bright pink flower that’s missing a petal now. “That’s too bad.”

“It wasn’t going to last forever, Haz.”

“I know. I was just hoping it’d last a little longer.”

“Here.” Louis manhandles Harry until he’s standing straight up in the middle of the room, hands at his sides, and pulls out his phone. “I’ll take a picture, yeah? We’ll put it on the art wall, the kids’ll love it.”

“Good,” Harry says, and he smiles so wide he can feel the paint around his dimples start flaking.

Louis shakes his head, smiling, and after they take the picture he kneels down and helps pull Harry’s pants legs down as Harry shoves his hair into a beanie, bows and beads and knots and all. When Louis stands back up he runs one hand up the entirety of Harry’s leg and Harry shivers; when he looks at Louis, Louis is smirking at him, so he fists one hand in his shirt and pulls Louis into his chest to kiss him, hot and dirty.

“Home,” Louis pants when he pulls away to breathe. “Now.”

“We’ve never fucked on your desk,” Harry says, but Louis shoves him away.

“And we never will, pervy! I am an educator of _children_.”

Harry whines and moves forward to nuzzle Louis’ neck. Louis sighs and runs a hand up Harry’s back, going to tangle in his hair, but laughs when he gets to the wreck it already is.

“Let’s go home, babe. Get you cleaned up.” He waggles his eyebrows when he says it, and Harry grins and heads for the door, pulling Louis along with one hand. Louis can’t stop touching him during the tube ride home, picking at the flaking paint on Harry’s arm. Harry smiles and just watches, enjoying the look of Louis’ fingers moving over his skin.

“I love how much you love those kids,” Louis murmurs when they’re almost to their stop.

“They’re great kids,” Harry says, and then he leans over to whisper in Louis’ ear, “we should make a few of our own. Tonight.”

Louis is grinning when he pulls away. “That’s not how it works, babe, you know that, right?”

Harry shrugs. “We’ll just have to practice, I guess.”

Louis throws back his head and laughs. “We can definitely do that,” he says, tucking himself under Harry’s arm and rubbing circles into his back. When they get home, Liam and Zayn are on the couch playing FIFA, but Harry doesn’t feel like joining them, just wants Louis’ hands all over him again, so he pulls Louis into their bedroom and shuts the door behind him.

Louis doesn’t skip a beat, just pulls off his coat and throws it on the floor, toes off his shoes as he asks, “Hair or paint first?”

“Hair,” Harry says, thinking about laying in bed with his head in Louis’ lap as he slowly pulls the knots out, but then he shakes his head. “No, paint, please.”

Louis smiles and pulls off his shirt, and then reaches over to pull off Harry’s. As soon as it’s over Harry’s head, he leans over and kisses him, hands going down to work on getting Harry’s jeans off. Harry lets him take charge, focusing on kissing Louis’ mouth, jaw, neck, anything he can reach, but he does have to reach down and pull off his boots before Louis can pull his jeans and pants all the way off.

“Now you,” Harry says into the crook of Louis’ neck, popping the button on his trousers open.

“Do you wanna take a shower?” Louis breathes into Harry’s hair, and Harry nods and moves back up to kiss Louis again. “Then we probably should have undressed in the bathroom,” Louis says, laughing.

“Your fault,” Harry says. “‘Sides. It’s not like either of them haven’t seen us naked.”

“That’s true,” Louis agrees, stepping out of his trousers.

The week after Harry and Louis had gotten back together, they’d spent a very memorable week in bed. It had been much like Harry’s first week after Louis had left - very little clothes or showering, leaving the room only to get food - except better, because instead of crying they’d just had sex. Well, they’d cried a little, too. There were a few very intense orgasms in there, and they’d both been a little overwhelmed. But anytime they left the room, even if Liam or Zayn or Niall or all three were there, neither Harry nor Louis had bothered to put clothes on.

It remains one of Harry’s absolute favorite weeks.

“Time to shower,” Louis says, bringing Harry back to himself, and he kisses Louis, deep, and reaches a hand into Louis’ pants under the pretense of just squeezing his arse, but really pulls them all the way down.

“Hey!” Louis protests, but Harry just grins.

“Wasn’t fair, being the only one naked.”

Louis wrinkles his nose and smiles at Harry before grabbing towels for both of them and heading for the shower.

“You are _not alone_!” Liam yells as they walk past the couch, but they ignore him.

Louis gets the water just the right temperature in the shower, one hand under the spray and one hand wrapped around Harry’s neck, keeping him close as Harry kisses his way down Louis’ chest. When they step in, Louis holds Harry against the wall of the shower, taking a soapy flannel to his arms, and it stops being quite so sexy as Louis has to scrub some of the paint off. Harry grimaces once or twice, but then Louis’ hand brushes over his cock and he can feel it start to fatten up.

It only gets harder when Louis drops to his knees to get at the paint on Harry’s ankles; Harry even lets out a moan when Louis breathes over it quickly.

Louis looks up at Harry, one eyebrow cocked. “Really?” he asks.

Harry grins sheepishly and shrugs. “Just likes you a lot, I guess.”

Louis rolls his eyes but after he’s done scrubbing the paint he kisses the inside of Harry’s knee, and then the inside of his thigh, and then higher on Harry’s thigh. Harry whines and angles his cock towards Louis, who ignores it and kisses down Harry’s other leg in the same way.

“ _Louis_ ,” Harry whines then, and Louis looks up at him from under his eyelashes, grin wide, before finally moving to mouth at the head of Harry’s cock. “ _Yes_ ,” Harry breathes, head leaning back against the shower as Louis licks a stripe up Harry’s cock before swirling his tongue around the head, one hand around the base. Harry feels himself growing in Louis’ mouth, and Louis moans and takes more of him down, cheeks hollowing out. Harry cups the back of Louis’ head with one hand before running it over his face. He can feel himself through the thin skin of Louis’ cheek, and Louis moans again and starts sucking harder, hand pumping what his mouth can’t reach.

It’s only a few minutes before Harry pulls at Louis’ head, muttering _‘m close_ , and Louis pops off Harry’s cock with an obscene noise before wanking him through his orgasm.

“That was so good, babe, such a good job for me,” Louis babbles as Harry slumps against the shower wall, boneless. Harry just pulls him up to kiss him, deep, tasting himself on Louis’ tongue, and then reaches down and wanks Louis off quickly, kissing him through it.

They leave the shower wrinkled like raisins, both of them grinning like fools, and Liam groans as they walk past him back to their room. “Again?!” he yells as their door closes, and they both laugh as they fall into bed.

Harry curls up with his head in Louis’ lap, letting Louis run his hands through the wet mess of Harry’s hair. Louis slowly works the barrettes and beads and knots out, and Harry drifts off to sleep.

A couple days later, Harry’s head itches. A lot.

He’s pretty sure it’s not that he didn’t wash the soap out of his hair this morning, but that’s only because he’d joined Louis in the shower again, half-asleep and fumbling, and Lou made him lean down so he could wash Harry’s hair, nails lightly scratching as he massaged the scalp. It was so good Harry almost fell asleep again, and then he blew Louis against the wall of the shower in thanks, one hand over Louis’ mouth so he wouldn’t make those noises that, personally, Harry loves, but that make Liam sigh really loudly and remind them that he also uses the shower, thank you very much, and he’d really appreciate it if they would stop. Having. Sex. In there.

Liam really, really needs to get laid.

Anyway, Harry’s head itches and it most likely has nothing to do with dried soap. He keeps one hand mostly tangled in his curls all day, whenever he’s not actively talking to his teachers or giving that one presentation he’s been working on all week.  He shoves the whole mess in a beanie for the way home, but that doesn’t stop him from leaning his head against the pole on the tube, hoping no one notices him rubbing against it like some kind of animal. Louis’ sitting on the couch when he gets to the flat, Liam nowhere in sight, so Harry immediately drops down and puts his head in Louis’s lap.

“My head itches,” Harry moans.

“Poor baby,” Louis says with a smirk, one hand automatically moving to scratch – until he stops suddenly. “Wait. Oh god, you had all those clips in your hair when you visited me at work the other day.”

“Yes. Why did you stop scratching, I like the scratching.” Harry moves his head closer towards Louis’ hand, essentially scratching himself on it, but Louis slaps his forehead, lightly, and then pushes at his shoulders to make him stand.

“Up, up, get up, we’ve got to do another load of laundry and we need to wash your hair,” Louis says, standing and gathering Harry’s jacket and beanie from where he dropped them on the floor. He turns back to the couch to see Harry still lying there, and groans. “Up, before I have to burn the couch and you with it.”

“What are you going on about?” Harry grumbles, doing as he’s told anyway. Louis picks up the blanket they keep thrown over the couch and puts it in a pile with Harry’s things, and then heads for their bedroom.

“Lice!” Louis calls back, and Harry thinks he hears him stripping the bed. “We discovered lice at school today, all the kids have it. That’s probably what’s making you scratch.”

Harry, who’d shoved his hand back into his hair the second Louis left him, stops in his tracks. “Lou, please don’t tell me I’m going to have to shave my head,” he says slowly.

“I’ll set your hair on fire myself if you don’t get in the shower and wash it right this second, Styles,” Louis says, bustling back out of their room with a pile of sheets.

Harry runs to the shower and turns it on, but as he’s waiting for the water to warm up he thinks of something and calls, “Hey, don’t you have to wash your hair with a special shampoo?”

Louis ducks his head into the room, looking pale, and then nods. “Shit, shit, shit, I’m off to the chemist!”

When Liam comes home a few hours later, Harry and Louis are sprawled on the floor, clean but unfolded laundry all around them, hair wet, asleep.

He wakes Harry up, whispers, “What’s up?”

“Lice,” he whispers back, voice rough. “But you’ve just shaved your head, you should be fine.”

Liam frowns. “How are you? Wedding’s in a few days.”

Harry shrugs. “We’ll see, I guess. I think we got them all, though.” He looks down at Louis, curled up against him, and runs a hand through his wet hair, currently soaking through his shirt.

“I sure hope so,” Louis whispers. Harry hadn’t even realized he was awake. “Don’t think they’ll let us in America if we’ve got lice.”

“Yeah, I think they stopped doing that in the 1800s,” Harry says, and they all laugh.

 

-

 

Zayn actually has an _art show_. The gallery owner he met through work absolutely _loved_ his stuff, couldn’t wait to put it in his gallery, and now Zayn has an _opening_ scheduled, he can put his art up for sale and see if anyone buys it and - 

He’s absolutely freaking out about it.

He doesn’t know who to talk to about it, either - normally he’d talk to Louis, but he and Harry have been looking into surrogacy and adopting ever since they got back from their honeymoon a few months ago, and when they’re not being grossly into each other they’re both stressed. He tried talking to Niall once, but then Niall just got him hopelessly drunk and told him he was awesome - which was helpful, but not quite what he was looking for.

Liam, though.

Zayn doesn’t really know what to do with Liam. They’re absolutely just friends, have been for over a year now, but Zayn’s not sure if that’s all he wants anymore, and that means he suddenly doesn’t know how to just _talk_ to him anymore.

Plus, when Zayn had told everyone about his show, Liam’s voice and face had gone all soft and he’d sounded so utterly sincere that all Zayn had wanted to do was kiss him.

And the thing is, he doesn’t think Liam would mind, really. Sometimes he gets these thoughts that Liam does still feel the same way about him as when they met, and it makes Zayn feel all warm inside while also scaring the shit out of him. He’s never had a lasting relationship, hasn’t even really had friends before these lads, and he doesn’t want to screw anything up.

So he doesn’t want to go to Liam for advice, because he’s almost entirely sure Liam will be kind and wonderful and it’ll take everything in Zayn not to lean in and kiss him.

He goes to Louis.

He feels bad about it, piling more on, but Louis practically collapses around his beer, say it’s all he’s needed all week, beer and a respite from baby talk.

“I love Haz, don’t get me wrong. And I’m _so_ excited for a baby, can’t wait, but it’s just. It’s hard, you know? The legal hoops we have to jump through are one thing, but we still have to decide if we want to try surrogacy, which means wanking into paper cups and through it all, both mine and Harry’s mums are absolutely relentless. Anne actually sent us a stroller last week. A stroller!” Louis takes a sip of his beer and then says, “Sorry. Sorry, I know I said I wanted to stop talking about it, but it’s so all-consuming, y’know?”

“Yeah, ‘course,” Zayn says, though he doesn’t really know. “It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. You invited me here to ask my advice, not to hear me whinge on about babies. What do you need?”

Zayn takes a breath to try to figure out how best to respond, and that’s when Louis says, “Is it about Liam?”

That throws Zayn for a loop, and he blusters, “No, it’s - I don’t - what _about_ Liam?”

“Nothing, nothing, definitely not my place to say anything, forget I said it, what do you want to talk about?”

“Well, I was going to talk about the art show but now I want to talk about this.”

“Oh, are you nervous about the show? It’s a big deal, but you’ve got this, Zayn, I have faith in you,” Louis says, completely innocent. Zayn frowns.

“What _about_ Liam?” he repeats. Louis holds his innocent smile for just a minute and then sighs.

“Just - the two of you would be so good together, I think, and I - it’s seemed like maybe you’re getting yourself in that space lately, like you can date him and be with him and it won’t be too much for you? I guess? I dunno, like I said, it’s definitely not my place.”

“Yeah,” Zayn says softly, a little struck by what Louis has said. “I think maybe - maybe I am in that space?”

Louis’ eyes go wide, joyful, and Zayn rushes to add, “But, like, I don’t want to get hurt, you know? Like, if he’s not. If you don’t think he would want. Y’know. Me.”

Louis is quiet for a minute, gaze on the table. He’s fighting back a smile when he finally looks back up at Zayn. “I think you’ll be surprised,” is all he says.

They talk about the art show for a while after that, but mostly Zayn can’t stop thinking about Liam. It actually helps him, leading up to the show; being nervous about Liam means he’s stopped being nervous about the opening, and it comes up faster than he ever realized.

Zayn spends the whole day leading up to the show that night at the gallery, dropping his stuff off and arranging it in the two small rooms he’s got just for him, trying to figure out which of his pieces will look best in the main room of the gallery, right when people come in. He’s sick of the whole thing by five, two hours before the show, so he calls the lads and everyone meets him at the pub.

Liam ends up sliding into the booth next to Zayn when he arrives, and Zayn stops holding back, lets himself press against Liam where he wants to, thighs and knees and shoulders. Liam is strong against him, but smiles his soft smile, and when everyone gets up to leave to head to the gallery, Zayn holds onto Liam’s arm with one hand, doesn’t let him leave.

Louis, bless him, herds Harry and Niall out, shooting Zayn an approving look and a smile as he does, so then it’s just Zayn and Liam, pressed up against each other in the booth.

“What’s up?” Liam asks.

“I just,” Zayn starts, but he doesn’t know where he wants to go from that, so he moves his hand from Liam’s arm to the front of his shirt, pulls him in to kiss him. Liam doesn’t move for a second, and then one of his arms slides around Zayn’s waist, tucking him against his chest, and he deepens the kiss.

It’s awkward, tucked into the booth like that, and Zayn’s going a bit lightheaded from Liam’s mouth on his, so he pulls away after a minute. Liam looks shocked but happy, and Zayn smiles.

“What was that for?” Liam asks. Zayn shrugs.

“Just wanted to kiss you. Been wanting to for a while, actually.”

“And?”

“We should probably do it again.”

A slow smile spreads across Liam’s face, and then he’s grinning and leaning back into Zayn.

“Yeah,” he breathes into Zayn’s mouth, “again.”

**Author's Note:**

> first and foremost thanks goes to [molly](http://underwaternow.tumblr.com), who responded to my tweets freaking out about “5 MAIN HIMYM CHARACTERS AND ALSO 5 1D MEMBERS” with the PERFECT cast and has spent the last four months talking this over with me constantly and being the wind beneath my wings. thanks also go to [jasmine](http://guillotineheart.tumblr.com), who helped me figure out storylines and convinced me to write basically the entire middle section, and was always really excited to read whatever i’d written and be my cheerleader when all i felt like i could write was “uuuuuuugggghhhh.” any mistakes still left in this story after these two got through with it are my own.
> 
> THANKS ALSO GO TO MY SISTER, CECI, who isn’t in the fandom but let me yell at her about this story while i drove her places and brainstormed exactly who some of the random name-dropped characters would be (a moment of silence for the loss of paul higgins as ranjit) and gave me a wonderful perfect idea for a section i ended up cutting completely. :( she ALSO spent the last week leading up to the deadline for this story yelling at me to “WRITE!!” anytime i saw her, ensuring that i actually finished this thing. AND she came up with the name zayn shimmer, and for that, she deserves a million fucking medals.
> 
> if you’d like to yell at me about how much harry and louis are actually marshall and lily (or other things, i guess), i’m on [tumblr](http://aconstantdelight.tumblr.com).


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